S.WEIR  Mil 


^FR.S. 


GIFT  OF 


v>^jiiUv>v>^  ^  S^'^^^-^ 


J. 


S.   WEIR  MITCHELL 

M.D.,    LL.D.,    F.R.S. 


1829-1914 


MEMORIAL  ADDRESSES 
AND  RESOLUTIONS 


Philadelphia 
1914 


l^ 


(f/'  0 


> 


CONTENTS 

Special  Meeting  of  the  College  of  Physicians. 

Minute   passed   by  the   Board   of  Trustees  of   the 
University  of  Pennsylvania. 

Minute  passed  by  the   Council  of    the   School  of 
Medicine,  University  of  Pennsylvania. 

Minute   passed    by  the    Directors    of    the   Library 
Company  of  Philadelphia. 

Minute   passed   by  the  Board  of   Trustees  of    the 
Jefferson  Medical  College. 

Joint  Meeting: 

The  College  of  Physicians  of  Philadelphia. 

The  American  Philosophical  Society. 

The  University  of  Pennsylvania. 

The  Library  Company  of  Philadelphia. 

The  Jefferson  Medical  College. 

The  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences. 


SPECIAL    MEETING 

OF   THE 

COLLEGE  OF  PHYSICIANS  OF  PHILADELPHIA 

UPON  THE  DEATH  OF 

DR.  S.  WEIR    MITCHELL 

January  6,  1914 


Dr.  James  Cornelius  Wilson 

PRESIDENT  OF  THE  COLLEGE 


THIS  special  meeting  of  the  College  has 
been  called  to  commemorate  with  honor 
and  solemnity  the  passing  away  of  a  Fellow 
who  has  long  been  known  not  only  among 
us  but  also  throughout  the  world,  in  the 
highest  human  sense,  as  a  great  physician. 
He  was  certainly  the  most  accomplished  and 
versatile  physician  of  our  times.  In  science, 
letters,  poetry,  history,  and  every  grace  of 
social  life  he  achieved  unusual  distinction.  He 
served  his  country  and  mankind  by  brilliant 
original  investigations  during  the  Civil  War, 
and  from  his  earliest  days  devoted  himself 
to  original  scientific  research,  and  by  example 
and  suggestion  inspired  others  to  engage  in 
similar  work. 

To  a  broad  patriotism  he  added  an  untiring 
interest  in  civic  affairs,  and  Philadelphia  will 
miss  his  wise  and  unselfish  devotion  to  her 
welfare.  As  an  educator  in  the  highest  sense, 
he  stands  forth  prominently  among  the  Trus- 
tees of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania  and 
the  Directors  of  the  Library  Company  of 
Philadelphia.    But  it  was  as  a  practitioner  of 


the  art  of  medicine  that  he  manifested  those 
qualities  of  mind  and  heart  that  enabled 
him  for  nearly  half  a  century  to  command  the 
admiration  and  affection  of  grateful  patients 
and  appreciative  professional  colleagues  in 
almost  every  civilized  country.  But  to  us  his 
life  has  another  meaning  and  the  splendid 
traits  of  his  character  a  deeper  significance. 
As  a  Fellow  of  this  College  he  showed  a 
steadily  progressive  interest  in  its  affairs  and 
an  ever-increasing  liberality  of  means  and 
energy  to  promote  its  welfare.  But  for  his 
conciliatory  spirit,  his  indomitable  will,  and 
his  power  to  influence  men,  this  beautiful 
hall  would  still  be  an  unrealized  hope.  If 
the  world  could  load  him  with  honors  as  it 
did,  how  much  more  it  is  for  us  to  pay  the 
homage  of  our  deep  appreciation  and  reverent 
affection  to  the  dear  colleague  whom  we  have 
lost  by  death,  Silas  Weir  Mitchell. 


TRIBUTE  TO  S.  WEIR  MITCHELL 
By  Dr.  W.  W.  Keen 

PRESIDENT  OF  THE  COLLEGE  FROM   1900   TO   1902 


11 


TN  this  same  hall  but  a  short  time  ago, 
-■-  at  a  memorial  meeting  in  honor  of  Henry 
C.  Lea,  I  spoke  of  our  ''Philadelphia  Trium- 
virate" of  eminent  men,  Henry  C.  Lea, 
Horace  Howard  Furness,  and  S.  Weir  Mitchell. 
Now  the  last  of  this  distinguished  trio — the 
most  remarkable  medical  man  I  have  ever 
known  in  Europe  or  America — has  passed 
away. 

My  first  acquaintance  with  S.  Weir  Mitchell 
was  in  the  first  week  in  September,  i860, 
over  fifty-three  years  ago — a  very  long  time 
for  an  intimate  friendship  unshadowed  by 
the  smallest  cloud. 

I  had  just  begun  the  study  of  the  bones. 
Gray's  Anatomy — then  quite  a  new  book — 
lay  before  me  and  in  my  hands  was  a  skull. 
The  window  was  open  and  the  hot  September 
sun  was  shut  out  by  Venetian  blinds,  as  in  the 
early  afternoon  I  sat  in  my  preceptor's  office 
where  now  the  Jefferson  Medical  College 
building  stands.  Suddenly  I  heard  the  blinds 
move  and  turning  around  I  saw  a  pair  of 
eyes    looking    between    the    now    horizontal 

13 


slats,  while  a  voice  outside  said,  ''Doctor, 
don't  you  want  to  help  me  in  some  experi- 
ments on  snakes?"  Flattered  by  a  doctorate 
won  by  only  three  days'  study,  and  ardently 
desiring  to  make  a  more  intimate  acquaint- 
ance with  snakes,  I  instantly  assented.  On 
going  to  the  door  I  saw  a  slender  young  man 
who  introduced  himself  to  me  as  Dr.  S.  Weir 
Mitchell.  Though  only  eight  years  my  senior 
— he  was  only  past  thirty-one — as  he  had 
been  a  graduate  in  medicine  for  ten  years  I 
looked  upon  him  as  far  above  my  ignorant 
youth.  Never  even  to  the  last  have  I  been 
able — nor  did  I  wish — to  annul  the  early 
habit  of  my  youth  and  regard  him  as  aught  else 
but  my  medical  father — my  beloved  master. 
Soon  after  the  war  broke  out,  when  Surgeon- 
General  Hammond,  at  Mitchell's  suggestion, 
established  some  special  hospitals,  including 
the  Hospital  for  Diseases  and  Injuries  of  the 
Nervous  System,  I  was  appointed,  at  his 
request,  the  junior  assistant  of  himself  and 
Morehouse.  Years  afterward  he  told  me  his 
reason  for  asking  for  my  appointment — that 

14 


he  found  when  I  was  a  student  that  ''he  could 
never  kill  me  with  hard  work" — a  cherished 
compliment. 

In  the  Christian  Street  Hospital  and  later 
at  Turner's  Lane  Hospital  for  nearly  two 
years  I  enjoyed  the  most  intimate  daily 
intercourse  with  him.  Still  later  in  the 
Orthopedic  Hospital  and  Infirmary  for  Ner- 
vous Diseases  I  was  his  surgical  colleague; 
in  the  College  of  Physicians  his  hearty  sup- 
porter; and  always  and  everywhere  his  warm 
friend. 

These  intimate  relations  resulted  in  the 
closest  medical  friendship  of  my  life.  I  owe 
to  him  more  than  to  anyone  else  the  path 
I  have  trodden,  the  literary  and  scientific 
impulses  I  have  received,  and  any  success  I 
may  have  achieved. 

He  taught  me  the  important  art  of  eluci- 
dating the  case  histories  of  patients;  the  im- 
portance of  little  hints  which  were  often  the 
insignificant  surface  out-croppings  of  a  rich 
vein  of  facts;  the  importance  and  methods 
of  cross-examination  to  ferret  out  the  truth, 

15 


and  above  all,  the  ability  to  interpret  these 
assembled  facts  in  making  a  diagnosis. 

He  had  a  wonderful  faculty  of  correlating 
widely  separated  facts  and  experiences,  often, 
it  might  be,  years  apart.  To  him  one  plus 
one  did  not  make  two,  but  resulted  in  three 
— a  tertium  quid — a  new  fact  or  inference. 

Never  have  I  known  so  original,  suggestive, 
and  fertile  a  mind.  I  often  called  him  a 
''yeasty"  man.  His  mind  was  ever  ferment- 
ing, speculating,  alert,  and  overflowing  with 
ideas.  With  these  he  leavened  the  minds  of 
his  fellows  and  set  their  ideas  fermenting. 
He  was  always  desirous  of  putting  everything 
to  the  test  of  experiment,  and  never  satisfied 
until  he  had  exhausted  all  possibilities.  Almost 
every  research  but  opened  a  vista  of  other 
and  still  more  interesting  problems  to  be 
solved.  An  hour  in  his  office  set  my  own 
mind  in  a  turmoil  so  that  I  could  hardly  sleep. 
His  was  indeed  an  elevating,  stimulating 
friendship.  Ideas  scintillated,  plans  were 
formed,  and  almost  always  took  concrete 
shape.    He  gave  points  to  the  botanists,  the 

16 


neurologists,  the  surgeons,  the  gynecologists, 
the  psychiatrists,  indeed  to  everybody.  Nihil 
tetigit  quod  non  ornavit. 

Even  to  the  last,  when  approaching  his 
eighty-fifth  birthday,  his  mind  was  as  alert 
and  suggestive  as  ever.  But  a  short  month 
ago,  at  the  dinner  given  to  the  officers  and 
council  of  the  College  of  Physicians  by  the 
president — a  custom  he  initiated — he  made 
three  suggestions  which  I  hope  with  pious 
affection  we  will  carry  out:  (i)  That  the 
College  of  Physicians  should  publish  a  ''Roll 
of  Honor" — a  handsome  book  containing  the 
many  names  of  the  Fellows  who  have  served 
in  the  Army,  Navy,  and  Public  Health  Ser- 
vice, in  the  War  of  the  Revolution,  of  1812, 
of  the  Mexican,  the  Civil,  the  Spanish-Ameri- 
can wars,  and  of  the  various  Indian  wars.  (2) 
That  we  should  publish  a  catalogue  raisonne 
of  our  splendid  collection  of  incunabula,  to 
which  I  would  add  of  our  specially  important 
and  rare  books.  It  would  be  a  notable  con- 
tribution to  medical  scholarship  and  culture. 

(3)   That  we  should   publish  each  month  a 

17    , 


bulletin  or  "compte  rendu/'  including  the 
proceedings  of  the  Sections  of  the  College, 
with  notes  on  especially  important  new  books, 
relics,  portraits,  etc. 

Personally  to  know  S.  Weir  Mitchell  was 
a  passport  in  any  gathering,  not  only  of 
medical  men,  but  of  laymen.  When  it  was 
announced  at  Harrisburg  a  year  ago  that 
Dr.  S.  Weir  Mitchell  had  come  to  oppose  a 
vicious  antivivisection  bill,  the  legislators 
crowded  to  meet  their  distinguished  visitor. 

I  well  remember  when  dining  with  Sir  James 
Paget,  who  as  president  of  the  International 
Congress  of  1881,  over  thirty  years  ago,  enter- 
tained one  hundred  guests  daily  for  a  week — 
how  pleased  I  was  when  that  eminent  surgeon 
said  to  me,  ''Dr.  Mitchell  is  one  of  the  most 
distinguished  medical  men  in  your  country,'* 
adding  after  a  pause,  ''or  in  any  country." 
This  opinion  was  emphasized  in  the  case  of  more 
than  one  American  patient  who  had  crossed 
the  Atlantic  to  consult  Paget,  by  his  advising 
them  to  return  to  America  and  consult  S.  Weir 
Mitchell,  the  highest  authority  on  their  troubles. 

18 


I  must  leave  to  others  to  speak  of  him  as 
a  novelist,  a  poet,  a  patriot,  or  a  citizen,  of 
his  own  original  researches,  and  of  his  ser- 
vices to  medical  education,  and  confine  my 
remarks  especially  to  his  services  to  our 
institution. 

His  services  to  this  College  can  never  be 
overestimated.  Twice  president  of  the  Col- 
lege— an  honor  conferred  upon  only  one  other 
of  our  Fellows  in  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
seven  years — his  friend  Dr.  J.  M.  DaCosta — 
his  life  was  closely  identified  with  its  history 
for  fifty-eight  years,  a  period  antedating  the 
birth  of  most  of  the  Fellows  of  the  College. 
The  College  was  an  ever-present  object  of 
solicitude.  He  was  continually  giving  books, 
curios,  paintings,  relics,  and  other  riches  to 
our  collections,  and  also  stimulating  others 
to  join  him  in  presenting  valuable  gifts. 

In  the  days  of  doubt  and  apprehension, 
when  we  were  debating  the  question  of  re- 
moval from  Thirteenth  and  Locust  Streets, 
his  wise  foresight,  happy  optimism,  persistent 
and   wonderful   success  in   raising   funds   for 

19 


what  seemed  at  times  an  almost  hopeless 
scheme,  encouraged  even  the  most  doubtful, 
and  finally  won  the  day.  This  vision  of 
splendor — it  is  not  too  strong  a  phrase  for 
the  finest  home  of  any  medical  society  in 
the  world — we  owe  to  him.  Appropriate 
indeed  is  Wren's  epitaph  in  St.  Paul's,  '^Si 
monumentum  quceris  circumspice,'" 

The  gifts  in  busts,  statues,  rare  books, 
portraits,  and  splendid  additional  endow- 
ments that  have  been  showered  upon  us 
since  we  dedicated  this  hall  witness  his  far- 
seeing  wisdom. 

Of  honors  he  received  his  rightful  share. 
To  say  nothing  of  the  recognition  of  his  worth 
by  many  American  universities  and  learned 
societies,  Bologna,  oldest  of  all  universities, 
at  the  celebration  of  the  eight-hundredth 
anniversary  of  its  foundation,  gave  him  an 
honorary  M.D.  Edinburgh  gave  him  its 
imprimatur  with  an  LL.D.,  and  he  was 
elected  a  Foreign  Associate  of  the  French 
Academy  of  Medicine,  of  the  Royal  Society, 
and  of  many  other  foreign  societies. 

20 


Very  rarely,  but  then  with  earnestness,  has 
he  spoken  to  me  of  his  spiritual  life;  but  on 
these  few  occasions  he  has  expressed  a  devout 
belief  in  the  Christian  religion  and  wondered 
that  men  could  live  without  deep  religious 
convictions.  Among  his  most  cherished 
friends  were  Bishop  Phillips  Brooks,  Bishop 
William  N.  McVickar,  and  Rev.  Dr.  Charles 
D.  Cooper. 

But  he  has  gone  to  his  eternal  rest  and 
reward.  Happily*  even  at  such  advanced  age, 
while  his  bodily  faculties  were  gradually 
failing,  his  mind  was  as  alert,  vigorous,  and 
inquisitive  as  ever.  He  has  sunk  to  rest  like 
an  unclouded  sun  in  full-orbed  splendor. 
Requiescat  in  pace. 


21 


TRIBUTE  TO  S.  WEIR  MITCHELL 
By  Dr.  James  Tyson 

PRESIDENT  OF  THE  COLLEGE  FROM   1907   TO   1910 


23 


WITH  Dr.  Mitcheirs  death  closes  a  career 
characterized  alike  by  brilliancy  and 
usefulness.  He  was  at  once  a  physician  and 
contributor  to  our  knowledge  of  disease  and 
its  treatment,  a  scientist,  a  skilled  writer  in 
prose  and  verse,  and  a  public  benefactor. 
This  meeting  of  the  College  of  Physicians  is 
called  that  we  may  give  expression  to  our 
^teem,  our  sorrow,  and  our  gratitude  for  the 
part  he  has  taken  in  placing  the  College  on 
that  high  plane  of  dignity  and  usefulness 
everywhere  acknowledged  of  it,  and  for 
what  he  has  done  in  securing  its  material 
prosperity. 

Doubtless  there  will  be  arranged  in  the  near 
future  a  memorial  meeting  for  which  suitable 
speakers  will  be  selected  who  will  enlarge  on 
the  life  and  work  of  this  great  man;  so  I  will 
occupy  only  a  few  minutes  of  your  time  in 
pointing  out  more  particularly  those  services 
which  have  resulted  in  associating  his  name 
with  the  history  of  the  College  more  closely 
than  that  of  any  other  man. 

Dr.  Mitchell  became  a  Fellow  of  the  College 

25 


in  1856,  and  at  the  time  of  his  death  was  the 
third  on  our  roll  of  membership.  He  was 
elected  during  the  period  when  the  College 
met  in  the  ''Picture  House/*  on  the  grounds 
of  the  Pennsylvania  Hospital,  built  fpr  the 
lodgement  and  display  of  Benjamin  West's 
great  picture  of  ''Christ  Healing  the  Sick/'  in 
what  I  have  called  elsewhere  the  fourth  home 
of  the  College.  He  often  alluded  humorously 
to  the  difficulty  he  had  in  securing  election 
on  account  of  the  school  prejudices  of  the 
day. 

His  activity  began  with  the  more  rapid 
growth  of  the  library,  which  started  with  the 
generous  gift  of  Dr.  Samuel  W.  Lewis  in  1864. 
His  first  substantial  contribution  was  the 
establishment  in  1880  of  the  Weir  Mitchell 
Library  Fund,  endowed  with  $1000,  which  he 
subsequently  increased  to  $5000.  This  gift 
was  followed  by  another  in  1883  of  $5000, 
subsequently  increased  to  $7000,  to  provide 
an  Entertainment  Fund  whence  the  Fellows 
could  be  entertained  at  such  times  as  the 
accumulated  interest  might  justify. 

26 


The  Directory  for  Nurses,  which  has  been 
one  of  the  benefactions  of  the  College,  he 
established  in  1882.  It  has  become  a  source 
of  considerable  revenue  to  the  College  as 
well  as  a  boon  to  the  community. 

Dr.  Mitchell  became  the  President  of  the 
College  in  1886  and  was  reelected  in  two  suc- 
cessive years,  and  again  in  1892,  with  like 
reelections  in  1893  and  1894.  These  adminis- 
trations were  characterized  by  untiring  efforts 
of  the  President  to  advance  the  interests  of 
the  College  in  many  ways.  The  most  striking 
of  these  was  the  continued  rapid  growth  of 
the  library  as  shown  in  the  gifts  of  books  and 
numerous  subscriptions  for  their  purchase. 

The  culminating  act  of  Dr.  Mitchell's  rela- 
tion to  the  College  of  Physicians  was  the 
erection  of  the  palatial  new  college  hall 
which  we  now  occupy.  Its  cost  in  round 
numbers,  for  lots  and  buildings,  was  $365,000, 
and  it  is  safe  to  say  it  would  not  have  been 
accomplished  for  many  years,  if  at  all,  but 
for  his  influence  and  assistance.  In  addition 
to  his  own   handsome   subscription,  he  was 

27 


instrumental  in  securing  very  large  sums 
from  others,  such  as  $100,000  from  a  single 
person,  $75,000  from  another,  $20,000  from 
another,  and  from  others  smaller  but  still 
large  sums. 

But  more  than  this.  Dr.  Mitchell  gave 
himself  to  the  College.  He  gave  of  his  hope- 
fulness, of  his  courage  and  enthusiasm,  of 
his  time  as  well  as  his  money.  He  might 
well  have  said  of  himself,  as  did  Sir  Jonathan 
Hutchinson,  that  he  was  "a  man  of  hope  and 
forward-looking  mind.''  The  college  hall  is 
at  once  a  product  of  such  a  mind  and  a 
monument  to  it.  In  scores  of  instances,  dur- 
ing and  outside  his  administrations  as  Presi- 
dent, he  aided  the  College  in  the  acquirement 
of  rare  and  valuable  books  and  curios,  adding 
greatly  to  the  value  of  the  library  and 
museum.  Let  us  pray  that  we  may  inherit 
the  undying  spark  with  which  to  continue 
the  work  he  has  commenced  in  so  many  lines. 

With  one  practice  which  characterized 
Dr.  Mitchell  I  am  inclined  to  think  few 
are    familiar,    because    his    refinement    and 

28 


thoroughly  patrician  instincts  would  naturally 
lead  him  to  conceal  it.  I  refer  to  the  practice 
of  rendering  financial  assistance  to  younger 
men  in  their  struggles  for  success  in  early 
professional  life.  This  he  would  do  either 
by  direct  loan  of  money,  unsolicited  though 
it  might  be,  or  by  sums  advanced  to  assist 
in  research  and  experiment  or  in  compensa- 
tion for  literary  work  or  professional  assist- 
ance. He  was  indeed  one  who  did  not  let  his 
left  hand  know  what  his  right  did.  The  fol- 
lowing lines  published  in  a  recent  issue  of  one 
of  our  daily  papers,  entitled  ''An  Apprecia- 
tion," so  accurately  reflect  the  truth  that  I 
take  the  liberty  of  quoting  them  in  conclusion : 

"Whoso  are  great  all  hail  him  great, 
And  honor  him  as  best  they  may, 
Each  in  his  own  appointed  way. 
But  they  who  judge  of  height  from  height 
Can  never  have  so  sheer  delight, 
So  true  a  measure  of  his  worth, 
As  those  of  lesser  birth; 
Who,  looking  upward,  feel  his  smile, 
And  knowing,  too,  the  while 
How  far  he  has  to  stoop 
To  be  so  passing  kind." 
29 


TRIBUTE  TO  S.  WEIR  MITCHELL 
By  Dr.  G.  E.  de  Schweinitz 

PRESIDENT  OF  THE  COLLEGE  FROM  1911   TO  1913 


31 


AT  one  time  or  another  each  member  of 
this  collegiate  body  must  have  thought 
of  the  great  emptiness  Dr.  Mitchell  would 
leave  when  he  went  away  from  us.  Now  we 
are  looking  into  it.  This  is  the  present  vision 
of  our  eyes,  and  there  is  no  tone  deep  enough 
for  regret,  no  word  fine  enough  to  beguile 
us  from  the  grief  of  our  loss.  And  yet,  keen 
though  our  sorrow  is,  we  hold  fast  to,  and 
make  record  of,  a  solemn  pride  which  is  our 
sustaining  right  in  that  with  honors  thick  upon 
him,  with  the  result  of  his  achievements 
named  and  famed  throughout  the  world,  this 
our  beloved  College  of  Physicians  was  ever 
the  favorite  object  of  his  heart.  Of  the  love, 
with  which  he  cherished  it,  of  the  thought  he 
gave  to  it,  of  the  labor  he  bestowed  upon  it, 
we  know,  and  we,  the  Fellows  of  the  College, 
are  the  beneficiaries  of  the  full-measured 
effort  he  brought  to  it.  The  last  words  he 
spoke  in  this  hall  were  a  plea  for  still  further 
widening  our  ever-increasing  sphere  of  useful- 
ness, and  ours  must  be  the  sacred  privilege  to 
do  those  things  which  he  would  have  done  had 

33 


he  been  spared  longer  to  live  and  work  with 
us.  On  some  other  occasion  full  record  will 
be  made  of  Dr.  Mitchell's  worth  and  work: 
how  he  lighted  the  lamp  of  his  genius  and 
became  the  salvor  of  the  nervous  wreck;  how 
he  mended  the  wear  and  tear  of  the  over- 
worked human  machine;  how  he  elaborated 
a  method  of  treatment  world-wide  in  its 
beneficial  results;  how  he  studied  and  solved 
the  problems  of  experimental  science;  how  he 
sweetened  the  lives  of  those  once  bitter  with 
the  sorrow  of  mental  and  of  physical  ills; 
how  his  songs  have  flowed  through  many  a 
heart;  how  his  books  have  brightened  the 
hours  of  those  who  read.  But  let  that  biog- 
rapher tell  also  of  the  warmth  of  his  friend- 
ship, of  the  stimulus  of  his  example,  of  the 
wealth  of  his  suggestions,  of  the  never-failing 
kindness  of  his  active  interest.  Let  him  tell 
what  he  did  for  the  young  men  of  our  profes- 
sion ;  how  the  wisdom  of  his  advice  smoothed 
away  the  ignorance  of  inexperience;  how  he 
steadied  feet  stumbling  along  the  path  of  early 
endeavor;    how  he  started  men,  young  men, 

34 


and  guided  them  on  the  sure  road  which 
leads  to  honorable  usefulness;  and  how  he 
did  all  these  things  with  a  fine  generosity 
that  it  is  a  joy  to  remember  and  a  privilege 
to  record. 

Mr.  President,  the  College  has  lost  its 
most  loved  and  distinguished  Fellow;  it  can 
never  lose  the  inspiration  of  his  splendid 
presence  nor  the  favor  of  his  example. 
These  are,  and  must  always  remain,  our 
most  treasured  possessions. 


35 


TRIBUTE  TO  S.  WEIR  MITCHELL 
By  Dr.  Frederick  P.  Henry 

HONORARY  LIBRARIAN   OF  THE  COLLEGE 


3i 


1HAVE  been  requested  by  the  President 
to  prepare  a  minute  expressive  of  the 
deep  feeling  of  bereavement  which  is  shared 
by  every  Fellow  of  the  College,  and  respect- 
fully submit  the  following: 

We  are  met  to  honor  the  memory  of  the 
most  remarkable  man  in  the  medical  history 
of  this  country.  We  have  had  many  illus- 
trious men  in  our  profession,  and  the  race 
is  by  no  means  extinct;  but  I  have  no  fear 
that  my  statement  will  be  challenged  nor  that 
it  would  be  if  I  included  in  it  the  medical 
profession  of  the  world. 

I  will  not  compare  Weir  Mitchell  with 
other  great  men,  for  it  is  not  by  comparison 
that  we  form  our  estimate  of  an  individual. 
I  will  simply  mention  a  few  facts  in  his 
remarkable  career  with  some  of  which  all 
present  are  probably  familiar,  but  with  all 
of  which  few,  if  any,  are. 

Although  never  occupying  a  chair  in  any 
medical  school.  Dr.  Mitchell  was,  through  his 
writings  and  his  active  participation  in  the 
proceedings  of  medical  societies,  the  teacher 

39 


of  those  who  taught.  He  was  a  pioneer  in  the 
sciences  of  experimental  physiology  and  neu- 
rology. I  was  familiar  with  his  name  as  an 
authority  in  medicine  when  I  was  a  medical 
student,  and  I  was  graduated  in  1868.  His 
life  was  a  complete  refutation  of  the  fallacy 
that  there  is  any  time-limit  to  a  man's 
capacity  for  original  work.  In  his  eighty- 
fifth  year  he  added  another  to  his  long  list 
of  successful  novels,  successful  in  the  highest 
sense  of  the  word,  for  they  have  secured  a 
permanent  place  in  English  literature. 

In  his  numerous  and  varied  activities  he 
represented  the  spirit  of  the  age,  but  he 
would  have  represented  the  spirit  of  any 
age  in  which  he  might  have  lived.  In  the 
days  which  we,  in  our  self-sufficiency,  regard 
as  primitive,  days  when  poetry  and  phi- 
losophy and  sculpture  and  architecture  at- 
tained a  degree  of  perfection  that  has  never 
been  surpassed  or  even  equalled,  Weir 
Mitchell  might  have  had  a  place  in  the 
Pantheon,  for  the  qualities  which  compelled 
the  admiration  and  respect  of  this  generation 

40 


were  the  very  ones  whose  possessors  were 
deified  by  Greece  and  Rome.  By  giving  a 
legitimate  scope  to  our  imagination  we  can 
think  of  him  as  a  disciple  of  ^sculapius,  who 
rivalled  his  master  and  was  accorded  equal 
honor  with  him,  and  in  that  imaginary  event 
we  can  fancy  the  noble  statue  of  ^sculapius 
which  adorns  our  hall  replaced  by  the  equally 
noble  figure  of  Weir  Mitchell.  It  is  far 
better  as  it  is,  far  better  for  us  who  have 
felt  the  direct  influence  of  his  quickening 
spirit,  and,  awakening  from  our  dream,  we 
may  thank  God  that  he  lived  in  our  day  and 
generation,  and  that  his  works  are  now 
among   our  incunabula. 

I  am  oppressed  by  the  thought  that  the 
noble  countenance  with  which  we  were  all  so 
familiar  is  now  but  a  memory;  that  I  shall 
no  more  sit  with  him  at  the  meetings  of 
the  Library  Committee,  where  we  delighted 
to  do  him  honor,  where  we  strove  to  antici- 
pate his  wishes,  and  where  his  suggestions 
were  our  commands. 

Although  his  face  is  but  a  memory  and  his 

41 


voice  no  longer  heard,  his  spirit  is  still  with 
us,  and  will  remain  so  long  as  we  maintain 
the  traditions  he  revered  and  which  have  as 
their  basis  the  virtues  of  honesty,  justice, 
and  truth.  These  formed  the  substratum  of 
his  own  character,  and  the  graces  of  gentle- 
ness, sympathy,  and  tact,  which  were  so  con- 
spicuous in  its  superstructure,  derived  their 
convincing  force  from  the  solid  foundation 
on  which  they  rested. 


42 


MINUTE  PASSED  BY  THE  BOARD  OF 

TRUSTEES  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  PENNSYLVANIA 


43 


WHEREAS,  We,  the  Trustees  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Pennsylvania,  have  heard 
of  the  recent  death  of  our  distinguished  asso- 
ciate, Silas  Weir  Mitchell,  M.D.,  LL.D.,  with 
profound  regret,  and  prompted  by  feelings  of 
sincere  sympathy  with  the  living  and  of  high 
regard  for  the  lamented  dead,  desire  to  make 
record  of  our  sentiments;  be  it  therefore 

Resolvedy  That  the  sad  intelligence  of  the 
death  of  Dr.  Silas  Weir  Mitchell,  a  death 
which  seems  sudden  and  unexpected  despite 
the  fulness  of  years  to  which  he  had  attained, 
has  come  as  a  shock  to  the  University,  well 
calculated  to  awaken  in  us  all  emotions  of 
unaffected  sorrow  and  lasting  regret. 

Resolved,  That  the  University  feels  justly 
proud  of  the  brilliant  and  distinguished  career 
of  a  son  whose  original  and  valuable  researches 
in  physiology  and  experimental  medicine, 
as  well  as  the  fruitful  cultivation  of  other 
fields  of  science,  enlarged  the  sum  of  human 
knowledge,  while  his  successful  work  as  a 
practitioner  of  rare  skill  and  deep  insight 
diminished  the  sum  of  human  suffering,  pro- 
fessional achievements  which,   no  less  than 

45 


his  remarkable  power  and  eminence  in  the 
realms  of  the  imagination  which  find  expres- 
sion in  literature,  made  the  name  of  Weir 
Mitchell  widely  known  and  highly  esteemed 
both  at  home  and  abroad  and  laid  a  firm 
foundation  for  a  fame  which  will  endure. 

Resohedy  That  we  deeply  deplore  the  loss  of 
Weir  Mitchell  as  a  man,  as  a  public-spirited 
citizen,  and  especially  as  a  Trustee  of  the 
University,  and  as  a  member  of  the  class  of 
1848,  and  shall  long  remember  the  energy 
and  the  far-sighted,  keen  interest,  the  zeal, 
tempered  by  experience,  and  the  persuasive 
cordiality  which  he  brought  to  her  service 
during  the  long  term  of  thirty-five  years  as 
a  member  of  this  board,  an  example  to  be 
emulated  by  us  who  remain  and  an  inspira- 
tion to  the  Trustees  that  shall  come  after  us. 

Resolvedy  That  these  resolutions  be  spread 
on  the  records  of  the  board  and  communi- 
cated to  the  faculties  of  the  University;  and 
that  a  copy  be  sent  to  the  surviving  members 
of  the  family  of  Dr.  Mitchell  as  a  respectful 
offering  of  the  sincere  sympathy  and  condo- 
lence of  the  Trustees  of  the  University. 

46 


A  MINUTE  OF  APPRECIATION  AND  ESTEEM 

ADOPTED   BY  THE  COUNCIL  OF  THE 

SCHOOL    OF    MEDICINE    OF    THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  PENNSYLVANIA 


47 


WE,  of  the  Council  of  the  School  of 
Medicine  of  the  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania, profoundly  affected  by  the  death 
of  Dr.  S.  Weir  Mitchell,  on  January  4, 
1 9 14,  desire  to  make  record  of  our  deep 
sorrow  and  to  bear  witness  to  our  personal 
loss,  and,  in  a  larger  sense,  to  the  loss 
which  our  School  of  Medicine  has  sustained. 

For  thirty-five  years  a  trustee  of  our 
University,  he  gave  to  all  her  departments 
full  measure  of  the  richness  of  his  influence, 
of  his  effort,  and  of  his  stimulus,  but  to 
none  of  them  more  liberally  and  more  wisely 
than  to  this  our  Department  of  Medicine. 

Of   his   distinguished    accomplishments   in 

experimental     science     and     their     practical 

application  the  world  possesses  an  admiring 

knowledge,   and   from   them   has   reaped   an 

ample    benefit.      His    work    in    comparative 

and   human   anatomy   and    physiology;     his 

researches  in   toxicology;     his  study  of  the 

remote  effects  of  injured  nerves,  the  outcome 

of    observations    while    loyally    serving    his 

country  during  the  Civil  War;   his  researches 

49 


■>.^,4^ 


on  the  venoms  of  poisonous  serpents;  his 
investigation  of  the  cause  of  functional 
nervous  diseases  and  his  introduction  of 
rest-cure  in  the  treatment  of  these  disorders, 
which  revolutionized  their  management,  is 
world-famed  in  its  importance;  his  recogni- 
tion of  the  significance  of  distant  symptoms 
in  their  interpretation  of  disturbed  function 
in  individual  organs;  his  establishment 
of  new  clinical  types  of  disease  and  his 
thorough  study  of  symptoms  and  their 
combinations;  his  lessons  in  nervous  disease, 
his  amazing  skill  as  a  healer  of  the  mentally 
sick,  and  his  never-flagging,  systematic,  and 
organized  research  in  all  that  pertains  to  the 
science  and  art  of  medicine,  constitute  a 
record  of  achievement  to  which  few  men 
attain. 

*'He  was  filled  with  the  spirit  of  scholar- 
ship, and  represented  its  finest  traditions,'* 
and  firm  as  was  his  place  in  the  world's  best 
work  in  science,  the  large  and  distinguished 
output  of  his  literary  talent  in  prose  and 
poetry  ever  enhanced  his  commanding  posi- 

50 


tion,  never  dimming  his  medical  effort,  but 
emphasized  its  happy  combination  with  his 
artistic  temperament. 

We  of  the  School  of  Medicine  must  ever 
bear  in  loving  remembrance  his  high  aims, 
his  interest  in  humanity,  his  never-failing 
generosity,  his  stimulating  suggestiveness, 
and  his  eagerness  to  help,  encourage,  and 
support  him  who  would  enter  the  field  of 
original  and  clinical  research. 

The  Departments  of  Physiology,  Neurol- 
ogy, and  Pathology  are  in  a  special  sense  the 
beneficiaries  of  his  unflagging  efforts.  Fore- 
most among  those  who  recognized  the  value 
to  the  medical  student  of  a  preparatory 
course  in  biology,  he  was  earnest  in  energiz- 
ing the  activities  of  our  School  of  Biology. 
Research  work  not  only  received  his  endorse- 
ment and  approval,  but  to  it  he  gave  direct 
and  personal  attention,  taking  part  with 
the  professor  of  physiology  in  some  of  the 
most  important  investigations  which  have 
been  carried  on  in  the  University  labora- 
tories.    Through   his  influence  large  grants 

51 


were  obtained  for  research  work  by  mem- 
bers of  the  University  faculties,  resulting 
in  discoveries  which  justly  have  taken  a 
foremost  rank  in   scientific  effort. 

Not  only  was  Dr.  Mitchell  the  inspiring 
spirit  in  all  forms  of  medical  laboratory 
work,  but  he  also  maintained  an  unceasing 
interest  in  the  improvement  and  expansion 
of  clinical  work,  especially  in  the  domain  of 
neurology  and  of  internal  medicine.  Indeed, 
so  important  and  so  various  were  the  direc- 
tions in  which  he  extended  his  influence  and 
his  abilities  in  all  these  respects,  that  the 
story  cannot  be  recorded  without  recalling 
almost  every  important  advance  in  the  his- 
tory and  achievements  of  the  School  of 
Medicine  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania 
during  the  last  forty  years. 

A  moral  force  in  social  and  civic  affairs, 
in  the  front  rank  of  literary  excellence,  pro- 
moter and  patron  of  scientific  and  medical 
research,  the  name  of  Dr.  Mitchell  takes 
enduring  place  in  the  history  of  American 
medicine  and  of  American  literature. 

52 


MINUTE  PASSED  BY  THE  DIRECTORS 

OF  THE  LIBRARY  COMPANY 

OF  PHILADELPHIA 


53 


ON  the  fifteenth  of  the  coming  February, 
Dr.  S.  Weir  Mitchell  would  have  com- 
pleted his  eighty-fifth  year.  Early  in  the 
morning  of  Sunday,  January  4,  after  a  quiet 
illness  of  less  than  seven  days,  he  died.  He  had 
been  a  director  of  the  Library  Company  of 
Philadelphia  since  April,  1875.  He  was  born 
and  educated  in  Philadelphia,  and  graduated 
at  the  Jefferson  Medical  College  in  1850. 

It  is  not  here,  in  our  intimate  memories 
and  affection,  that  we  either  need  or  wish  to 
dwell  upon  him  as  a  great  physician,  or  a 
distinguished  man  of  letters,  or  to  narrate  the 
steps  of  his  long,  illustrious  life.  That  will  be 
done  in  many  places,  both  within  and  outside 
of  his  own  country.  Let  us  remind  ourselves 
merely  of  this:  that  he  published  his  first 
medical  paper  in  1852,  at  the  age  of  twenty- 
three,  and  that  threescore  years  later  he 
wrote  his  last  novel,  WestwaySy  which  has 
rivalled  in  popularity  and  far  surpassed  in 
excellence  the  tales  of  authors  young  enough 
to  be  his  sons  and  grandsons.    All  of  us  know 

the  activity  that  crowded  that  span  of  sixty 

55 


years;  all  of  us  are  aware  of  its  wide,  unceas- 
ing beneficence;  he  served  his  fellow-men  in 
countless  ways,  and  his  unknown  deeds  of 
kindness  were  as  constant  as  those  which 
brought  him  public  renown  and  gratitude. 
He  would  have  died  a  rich  man  but  for  the 
act  of  repairing  with  his  private  fortune  his 
share  of  the  loss  to  stockholders  and  depositors 
occasioned  by  the  failure  of  a  trust  company 
of  which  he  was  a  director.  This  voluntary 
act  set  an  example  of  honor  and  integrity  in 
itself  alone  enough  to  make  him  a  memorable 
citizen. 

It  is  as  a  friend  we  think  of  him  here,  loyal, 
wise,  unforgetting;  a  warm  heart,  a  generous 
hand.  It  is  hard  to  imagine  the  streets  of  our 
town  without  his  familiar  face. 


.'' 


MINUTE  PASSED  BY  THE  BOARD  OF 

TRUSTEES  OF  THE  JEFFERSON 

MEDICAL  COLLEGE  OF 

PHILADELPHIA 


57 


THE  Trustees  of  the  Jefferson  Medical 
College  of  Philadelphia  desire  to  place 
upon  their  records  an  expression  of  their  sense 
of  the  great  loss  sustained  by  the  medical 
profession,  by  literature,  and  by  the  commu- 
nity at  large  in  the  death  of  Dr.  S.  Weir 
Mitchell. 

It  was  his  good  fortune — ^rarely  enjoyed 
by  any  man — to  win  lasting  fame  in  several 
widely  different  directions.  As  a  practising 
physician  and  the  author  of  many  noted 
works  on  medical  subjects,  he  was  a  leader  in 
his  profession;  and  was  recognized,  here  and 
abroad,  as  one  of  its  commanding  figures. 
In  the  domain  of  literature  he  won  great 
distinction  as  a  poet  and  novelist;  and  his 
wonderful  activity  in  this  field,  which  com- 
menced before  he  had  reached  middle  life 
and  lasted  until  the  close  of  his  days,  earned 
for  him  a  reputation  in  the  world  of  letters 
vastly  more  widespread  than  that  which  was 
purely  professional. 

His  personal  character  was  as  admirable 
as   it   was   attractive,  and    his   civic   duties 

59 


were  discharged  with  zeal  and  with  fidelity 
to  the  highest  standards  of  morals  and  good 
government. 

The  Jefferson  Medical  College  has,  during 
its  long  career,  sent  out  to  the  ranks  of  the 
profession  many  men  who  became  a  great 
honor  to  their  alma  mater.  In  the  list  of 
these  alumni.  Dr.  Mitchell's  name  may, 
without  discredit  to  any  other,  be  placed  at 
the  head;  where,  for  all  time,  it  will  stand. 

Clarum  et  venerabile  nomen. 


60 


RESOLUTION   ADOPTED    BY  THE  COLLEGE   OF 

PHYSICIANS  OF  PHILADELPHIA  INVITING 

OTHER  ORGANIZATIONS  TO  JOIN  WITH 

THE  COLLEGE  IN  A  MEMORIAL 

MEETING 


THE   College   of   Physicians  of   Philadel- 
phia, at  its  meeting  on  February  4,  19 14, 
adopted  the  following  resolution: 

Resolved,  That  a  committee  be  appointed  to 
arrange  for  a  memorial  meeting  to  Dr.  S.  Weir 
Mitchell,  and  to  invite  such  other  organizations 
to  join  with  the  College  in  such  meeting  as  they 
may  deem  wise. 

In  accordance  with  this  resolution,  the 
President  appointed  Dr.  George  E.  de 
Schweinitz,  Dr.  W.  W.  Keen,  and  Dr.  Wil- 
liam J.  Taylor  a  committee  to  arrange  for 
this  memorial  meeting. 

At  a  meeting  held  for  this  purpose  on 
February  12,  1914,  these  gentlemen,  with 
Mr.  C.  C.  Harrison  and  Dr.  Robert  G. 
LeConte,  who  represented  the  University  of 
Pennsylvania;  Mr.  John  Cadwalader  and  Mr. 
Joseph  G.  Rosengarten,  who  represented  the 
American  Philosophical  Society;  Mr.  George 
Harrison  Fisher  and  Mr.  Owen  Wister,  who 
represented  the  Library  Company  of  Phila- 
delphia; Dr.  Charles  B.  Penrose  and  Dr. 
F.  X.  Dercum,  who  represented  the  Academy 


of  Natural  Sciences;  and  Mr.  William  Potter, 
the  President  of  the  Board  of  Trustees,  and 
Dr.  Dercum,  who  represented  the  Jefferson 
Medical  College,  arranged  for  a  joint  meeting 
of  these  various  organizations,  and  full  power 
was  given  to  Dr.  George  E.  de  Schweinitz, 
Dr.  W.  W.  Keen,  and  Dr.  William  J.  Taylor, 
who  represented  the  College,  to  make  all 
arrangements. 


A   JOINT    MEETING 

OF 

The  College  of  Physicians  of  Philadelphia 

The  American  Philosophical  Society 

The  University  of  Pennsylvania 

The  Library  Company  of  Philadelphia 

The  Jefferson  Medical  College 

AND 

The  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences 

WAS  HELD 

IN    MEMORY    OF 

S.  WEIR  MITCHELL,  M.D.,  LL.D.,  F.R.S. 

ON 

Tuesday  Evening,  March  Thirty-first 

NiNETEEN-FOURTEEN 

IN  THE  Hall  of  the  College  of  Physicians 
Twenty-second  Street  above  Chestnut  Street 

DR.  JAMES  C.  WILSON 

THE  PRESIDENT  OF  THE  COLLEGE   OF   PHYSICIANS 

PRESIDED 

AND   ADDRESSES   WERE  DELIVERED   BY 

MR.  TALCOTT  WILLIAMS       DR.  WILLIAM  H.  WELCH 

OF  COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  OF  JOHNS  HOPKINS  UNIVERSITY 

AND 

MR.  OWEN  WISTER 

OF   PHILADELPHIA 
61 


INTRODUCTION  BY  THE  PRESIDENT  OF 
THE  COLLEGE  OF  PHYSICIANS 

Dr.  James  Cornelius  Wilson 


63 


LITTLE  more  than  four  years  have  elapsed 
since  this  building  was  completed  and 
this  hall  inscribed  with  the  name  of  one 
whom  every  Fellow  of  the  College  delighted 
to  honor.  On  two  occasions  in  the  past 
it  has  been  the  scene  of  meetings  to  com- 
memorate with  solemnity  the  life  and  services 
of  great  citizens  who  have  ceased  from  their 
labors.  Tonight,  for  the  third  time  in  that 
short  period,  it  witnesses  a  united  tribute  of 
love  and  appreciation ;  on  this  occasion  to  one 
who  was  in  the  highest  sense  a  great  citizen 
and  a  great  physician. 

Lea,  Furness,  Mitchell!  Friends  and  con- 
temporaries! Joyous  toilers  in  the  rich  fields 
of  usefulness  to  their  fellow-men.  Unconscious 
of  the  passing  of  the  years,  since  with  every 
decade  came  new  skill  in  doing  the  beloved 
work  and  a  renewed  sense  of  power  and 
success.  Young  in  old  age,  until  in  a  brief 
day  of  suffering,  youth  became  immortality. 

It  is  well  that  we  are  here  tonight  to  do 
Mitchell  the  homage  of  our  grateful  remem- 
brance.   This  assemblage  represents  the  things 

65 


that  were  dear  to  him — science,  the  arts, 
letters,  good  citizenship,  his  own  beloved 
profession.  In  it  are  those  with  whom  he 
loved  to  be  joined  in  rendering  service — 
educators,  librarians,  public  men,  journalists, 
clergymen,  and  his  associates  in  the  great  insti- 
tutions which  have  come  together  to  render 
this  tribute  to  his  memory.  There  are  others, 
also,  who  joyously  rise  up  to  call  him  blessed, 
two  groups  of  them:  those  who  were  sick  but 
by  his  skill  have  been  made  well,  and  those  who 
by  his  teaching  have  learned  the  art  to  cure. 
It  is  meet  that  we  should  be  assembled 
in  this  place  in  honoring  his  memory.  The 
College  of  Physicians  was  always  in  his 
thoughts.  From  the  time  when  he  became  a 
Fellow  in  1856  until  his  death  he  was  con- 
stantly active  in  its  affairs.  His  last  brief 
address  concerned  the  interests  of  the  College, 
and  was  spoken  to  a  group  of  friends  in  this 
hall.  In  every  movement  of  its  wonderful 
progress  and  development  he  was  an  earnest, 
wise,  and  enthusiastic  leader.  He  served  as  its 
president  from  1886  till  1889  and  again  from 

66 


1892  till  1895.  His  contributions  to  its 
scientific  business  were  many,  and  always  of 
the  highest  order.  They  were  usually  brief, 
but  invariably  suggested  much  more  than  was 
said.  He  gave  us  of  his  best.  His  interest  in 
the  books  never  flagged.  His  regular  attend- 
ance at  the  meetings  of  the  library  com- 
mittee was  an  inspiration.  His  gifts  of  rare 
and  curious  volumes  were  without  stint,  and 
he  inspired  others  to  give.  Bibliophile  of  a 
very  high  order,  he  made  those  who  were 
near  to  him  also  diear  lovers  of  books,  just 
as  he  aroused  in  younger  men  the  love  of 
science  and  the  spirit  of  scientific  research. 

In  1878  he  placed  in  the  keeping  of  the 
Secretary  of  this  College  a  sealed  envelope 
upon  which  was  written  over  his  signature 
the  words,  ''Not  to  be  opened  until  my  death." 
On  the  sad  day  of  his  funeral  it  was  found  to 
contain  this  statement:  ''I  give  to  the  Col- 
lege of  Physicians  of  Philadelphia  the  copy  of 
the  original  portrait  of  Harvey  and  that  of 
John  Hunter,  the  gift  to  become  effective 
upon  my  death." 

67 


If  you  wish  to  know  what  he  thought  of 
this  College,  read  his  occasional  addresses  as 
they  appear  in  the  volumes  of  the  Transac- 
tions, especially  those  delivered  at  the  cere- 
monies of  the  dedication  of  this  building.  If 
you  wish  to  know  what  he  has  done  for  it, 
behold  the  building  itself,  for  the  success  of 
the  movement  which  brought  it  into  exist- 
ence is  largely  due  to  the  broad-mindedness, 
the  indomitable  will,  and  the  knowledge  of 
men  which  were  prominent  traits  in  the 
character  of  Silas  Weir  Mitchell. 

I  have  spoken  of  him  thus  briefly  as  citizen, 
friend,  physician,  as  though  he  was  not  only 
of  us,  but  ours.  But  he  is  not  ours  alone; 
he  belongs  to  the  illustrious  succession  to 
whom  the  world  everywhere  accords  the 
unquestioned   title  of  great. 

The  orators  of  the  evening  will  speak  in 
turn  to  you  of  Dr.  Mitchell's  abundant  and 
splendid  life,  of  his  distinguished  scientific 
work,    and   of   his   rare   literary  gifts. 


68 


The  President:  The  first  address  is  that  of 
Mr.  Talcott  Williams,  of  Columbia  University, 
close  and  familiar  friend  of  many  years. 


69 


S.  WEIR  MITCHELL 
By  Talcott  Williams 


71 


THE  ripple  of  welcome  which  you  have 
given  me  at  this  hour  of  sorrow,  in  the 
place  where  I  was  once  at  home  and  am  now 
but  a  stranger,  moves  me;  but  this  is  not  a 
moment  when  you  or  I  are  thinking  of  our- 
selves. I  look  about  me  and  see  in  ranked 
ranges  in  this  hall,  which  carries  his  name,  the 
faces  of  those  who,  like  myself,  through  long 
years  lived  in  that  great  life,  greatly  lived.  I 
am  here,  as  are  the  many  here  who  knew  him 
well,  in  this  last  hour  in  which,  with  him  as 
our  centre,  we  meet  together  to  remember 
and  to  recall  the  very  heart  of  the  one  friend- 
ship of  life  which  has  dominated  and  inspired 
us  all. 

Each  of  us  can  but  review  and  renew  a 
record,  unfading  and  unfailing,  whose  every 
thought  brings  with  it,  not  grief  alone,  but  a 
note  of  high  triumph,  that  such  a  man  should 
have  lived,  still  more  that  his  life  should  have 
been  shared  by  us,  and,  most  of  all,  that  it 
shall  remain  a  perpetual  inheritance  of  us  all, 
of  this  city,  of  this  College,  and  of  its  radi- 
ating influence  and  instruction  through  years 

73 


to  come,  touching  many  to  their  heaHng,  them- 
selves unconscious  of  his  share  in  that  great 
and  beneficent  tide  of  the  calling  to  which 
he  belonged.  Its  lofty  traditions  he  never 
forgot ;  in  its  honor  he  gloried ;  and  to  it  he 
added  through  all  his  working  years. 

Six  corporate  bodies  gather  here  to  do 
honor  to  his  name.  Four  of  them — the 
University  of  Pennsylvania,  the  American 
Philosophical  Society,  this  College,  and  the 
Philadelphia  Library — were  organized  before 
the  Revolution,  when  no  one  thought  of  the 
independence  of  the  United  States.  Two 
others — the  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences 
and  the  Jefferson  Medical  College — were 
organized  by  those  who  knew  the  men  of 
the  Revolution.  It  is  in  this  background  of 
Revolutionary  memories  that  we  should  set 
this  life.  When  he  was  born  the  adminis- 
tration of  Washington  was  no  farther  away 
than  is  for  us  today  the  administration  of 
Arthur.  In  his  boyhood  days  the  end  of  the 
Revolution  was  as  close  to  his  life  as  is  to  us 
the  life  of  Lincoln.    He  passed  his  early  days 

74 


knowing  those  who  had  done  the  work  of 
the  Revolution.  Bishop  Meade,  the  son  of 
an  aide  of  Washington,  sat  often  at  his 
father's  table.  He  was,  himself,  the  intimate 
friend  of  Bache,  the  grandson  of  Franklin. 
He  was  born  and  lived  in  the  colonial  quarter 
of  the  city,  in  that  day  but  little  changed. 
In  the  day  of  Washington  the  ''Red  City*' 
ran  to  Eighth  Street.  The  houses  of  that  day 
were  on  the  streets  he  early  knew.  The  men, 
of  sixty  or  so,  whom  he  knew  in  his  boyhood, 
in  their  boyhood  had  seen  Howe  and  his 
troops  in  the  streets  of  Philadelphia.  In  his 
boyhood  days  houses  extended  only  to  Broad 
Street,  and  he  remembered  well  that  "there  was 
good  skating  at  Broad  and  Walnut  Streets,'* 
and  that  ''beyond  Sixteenth  Street  no  house 
broke  the  long  road  to  the  Schuylkill."  In  a 
century  and  a  half  the  built  city  had  devel- 
oped to  less  than  half  the  narrow  limits  which 
Penn  and  Holmes  had  marked  for  it. 

In  this  little  town,  so  small,  so  slow  in  its 
growth,  were  still  the  colonial  characters  of 
whom,  as  James  Russell  Lowell  once  at  his 

75 


table  said  of  those  of  a  like  stamp,  lineage,  and 
training  in  Boston,  that  they  seemed  to  him 
the  most  flavored  with  personal  quality  of  all 
the  men  and  women  that  he  had  met  in  a 
wide  survey  through  his  lifetime,  which  had 
known  the  best  of  both  worlds,  the  old  and 
the  new.  The  poet  of  the  smooth,  sliding 
Charles  added  that  Philadelphia  shared  and 
represented  these  colonial  characters,  original 
without  being  provincial,  who  had  never 
either  looked  up  or  down,  but  saw  life  level- 
eyed.  Such  men  and  women  Dr.  Mitchell 
met.  His  own  days  were  enriched  by  their 
ideal  of  life.  He  was,  for  us  all,  the  last  vivid 
link  and  reminder  of  those  days,  simple  but 
strong,  when  our  land  emerged  to  national 
consciousness  and  developed  the  complex 
period  we  know. 

He  came  of  sturdy  Scotch  stock,  which  had 
tarried  for  a  season  in  Virginia.  His  grand- 
father was  the  Mitchell  who  gave  to  Robert 
Burns  the  post  by  which  he  lived.  His 
mother  came  from  a  manufacturing  family 
of  wide  relation   in  central  England,  and  a 

76 


brother  of  hers  proposed  to  adopt  the  young 
son  whom  he  loved.  Death  frustrated  this 
purpose.  Had  London  been  more  kindly  to 
Franklin  he  would  have  been  lost  to  us.  By 
chances  as  narrow  as  these  do  cities  miss  the 
greatness  which  great  men  give  when  they 
walk  their  streets.  Had  England  been  his 
home,  Dr.  Mitchell  was  justified  in  feeling 
that  the  success  of  the  merchant  and  man  of 
affairs  would  have  been  his.  As  Dr.  Samuel 
Johnson  said,  a  man  with  a  strong  pair  of 
legs  can  walk  east  as  easily  as  west. 

With  a  candor  all  his  own.  Dr.  Mitchell 
in  the  autobiography  which  he  has  left  has 
described  his  early  days.  He  came  of  a 
religious  family,  in  a  religious  day,  when  the 
Church  was  present  in  all  the  affairs  of  life; 
and  I  venture — that  the  boy  still  young  may 
be  before  us — to  read  a  single  passage  from 
this  autobiography,  which  to  you,  as  with 
me  when  I  read  it,  will  suddenly  bring  before 
us  the  vision  in  early  boyhood  of  one  whom 
we  have  known  only  in  his  maturer  years: 
"When  we  stayed  at  Aunt  we  had  to 

77 


go  to  church  twice  on  Sunday  and  say  a 
text  daily,  and  the  Presbyterian  services  were 
of  portentous  length.  I  found  that  I  could 
smuggle  in  with  me  a  small  copy  of  Midship- 
man Easjy  and  in  a  dark  corner  of  the  pew 
comfort  myself  therewith.  A  son  of  my 
aunt  used  to  stay  with  us  there,  and  as  I 
disliked  him,  we  not  infrequently  had  com- 
bats, and  such  results  as  were  visible  had  to 
be  laid  to  diverse  causes." 

He  felt,  himself,  that  in  his  early  studies 
he  was  ill-taught.  He  developed  slowly. 
His  lessons  were  a  wearisome  task.  To  the 
last  he  did  not  so  much  learn  as  absorb, 
finding  his  harvest  in  every  field  along  the 
open  road  of  his  life.  Bit  by  bit,  in  his  early 
years,  he  pieced  together  the  beginning  of  the 
marvelous  knowledge  which  clothed  him  at 
the  last  with  a  panoply  of  learning.  Even 
in  college  he  regretted  that  he  obtained  less 
than  the  opportunity  offered,  for  it  is  true,  as 
we  all  know,  that  while  studies  are  '^pursued'* 
in  college,  they  are  not  always  overtaken. 
There  is  much  in  college,  however,  besides 

78 


study  and  books — there  are  men.  There 
began  for  him  the  friendship  for  years  of 
Henry  Wharton.  There  he  first  felt  the 
touch  of  science  from  Frazier.  Through  life 
there  was  to  live  with  him  the  passion  for 
literature  which  he  caught  from  Reed.  From 
the  very  motto  of  the  University  which  he 
attended  he  learned,  as  all  learn,  that  knowl- 
edge and  learning  and  thoughts  and  works 
of  men  are  vague  without  the  foundation  of 
morals.  There  began  in  those  days,  when  re- 
ligion was  all  about,  and  the  habit  of  weekly 
attendance  was  universal,  his  habit  which  con- 
tinued all  his  days.  Through  all  his  years  on 
Easter  Sunday  he  sought  Christ  Church,  and 
there  but  a  year  ago,  as  in  all  previous  years, 
he  sat  through  the  service  which  years  had 
made  his  own.  The  winds  of  criticism  and 
the  doubts  of  the  day  passed  him  by;  he 
remained  through  all  his  life  of  that  simple 
and  sincere  faith  which  he  had  early  known 
and  seen,  which  he  cherished  to  the  end,  of 
which  he  spoke  as  infrequently  as  all  men 
speak  of  that  which  is  the  depth  and  founda- 

79 


tion  of  their  lives.  But  through  all  the  sor- 
rows that  came — and  many  came  to  him — 
there  were  moments  when  he  must  have  felt, 
as  the  prophet  did:  ^^Look  upon  my  sorrow 
and  see  if  the  sorrow  of  any  of  the  sons  of 
men  has  been  like  unto  my  sorrow;''  he  found 
there  the  support  to  which  he  unhesitatingly 
turned.  Tonight's  joint  record  of  his  life 
would  be  incomplete  without  this  testimony 
from  one  who  knew  him  long  and  loved  him 
well.  In  years  when  all  of  us  shall  feel  mov- 
ing beneath  our  feet,  weary  with  the  long 
journey,  the  shifting  sands  which  men  seek 
to  build  upon  in  our  days,  we  shall  gather 
from  him  inspiration,  strong  conviction,  and 
the  certain  footing  of  the  upward  path  whose 
end  is  light. 

The  true  education  of  his  life  came  from 
the  societies  which  here  are  gathered  together 
in  his  honor  and  memory.  In  his  autobi- 
ography he  has  recorded  that  his  education 
began  and  almost  ended  in  the  books  of  the 
Philadelphia  Library.  There  he  was  taken 
by  his  father  after  his  mother  had  locked  up 

80 


the  solitary  copy  of  the  Arabian  Nights  which 
he  found  and  which  she  discovered.  Neither 
he  nor  his  brothers  were  able  to  learn  a  line 
of  their  lessons  while  he  stood  ready  to  read 
the  tales  of  Scherezade. 

In  the  shelves  of  the  Philadelphia  Library, 
and  in  the  folio  volumes  which  he  carried 
to  his  house  when  he  was  so  small  that  he 
could  but  spread  them  upon  the  floor  and  lie 
at  full  length,  he  received  through  young 
years  the  training  of  a  lifetime.  As  I  read 
the  titles  which  he  recorded  of  books  he  read 
before  he  was  ten,  I  suddenly  understood 
how  his  boyhood  was  one  which  was  per- 
petually enlarging.  Once  in  lecturing  he  gaily 
told  the  girls  of  Radcliffe  that  the  reason  why 
he  wrote  novels  was  because  having  read  all 
there  were  to  be  had  he  desired  more.  This 
was  almost  literally  true,  of  his  life  so  thronged 
with  travail,  travel,  and  libraries.  He  found 
time  for  one  or  two  volumes  a  week  of  fiction, 
and  in  some  amazing  fashion  added  to  his 
life  twenty  to  thirty  volumes  a  year — blend- 
ings  of  all  sorts  and  orders,  on  all  subjects, 

81 


and  no  current  verse  of  weight  did  he  miss. 
English  was  his  reading.  Other  tongues  he 
used  but  enjoyed  not. 

From  the  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences  he 
received  the  first  impulse  toward  the  study 
of  Nature.  It  was  as  a  naturalist  and  not 
as  a  physician  that  he  was  elected  a  member 
of  this  early  American  centre  of  research, 
record,  and  discovery. 

At  Jefferson  College  he  records  that  he 
first  learned  concentration  of  mind,  that 
there  he  gained  the  capacity  both  to  learn 
and  to  impart  knowledge.  Was  there  ever, 
for  any  of  us,  such  another  teacher  as  he,  so 
alluring,  so  electrifying,  so  capable  of  inducing 
thought,  stimulating  work,  and  piloting  to 
discovery? 

It  was  his  father's  influence  which  carried 
him  through  the  'teens  of  his  early  youth 
and  enabled  him  to  break  the  bar  of  physical 
weakness  and  to  lay  the  strength  for  the  future 
in  four  years  spent  with  boat  and  rod  and 
gun  upon  the  rivers  that  surround  this  city. 
It  was  from  his  father's  inspiration  that  he 

82 


slowly  built  the  foundation  of  knowledge 
which  was  necessary  for  his  medical  train- 
ing, and  it  was  from  his  father  that  there 
came  to  him  that  sense  of  the  long  succession 
of  life  for  the  physician,  in  which  genera- 
tions succeed  generation,  in  which  men  of 
this  lofty  calling  housed  here  live  whereso- 
ever they  move  in  the  house  of  their  fathers, 
of  their  land  and  of  their  vocation,  and  find 
in  the  corporate  life  of  some  college  like  this 
the  sense  alike  of  the  inheritance  and  the 
perpetuity  of  the  professional  life  to  which 
they  belong.  More  than  half  a  century  has 
passed  since  his  father  departed,  and  since 
it  is  alike  a  record  of  his  father  and  an  un- 
conscious record  of  himself,  I  read  what  in 
his  autobiography  he  says  of  Dr.  Mitchell: 
"My  father  was  the  best  physician  I  ever 
knew.  He  never  failed  in  his  resources; 
there  was  always  something  in  reserve.  The 
social  qualities  of  the  man,  and  a  certain 
buoyancy  that  helped  men  made  admirable 
additions  to  his  qualities  of  mind;  and  the 
charm  of  a  modulated  voice  and  of  singular 

83 


beauty  were  not  wanting.  It  would  not  have 
been  easy  to  find  a  better  example  of  all  the 
qualities  that  win  success  in  my  profession/' 
There  were  many  chances  open  to  him,  and 
the  father  of  whom  he  wrote  once  told  him, 
as  he  records  in  his  autobiography,  that  his 
son  had  no  qualifications  that  made  the 
physician.  Judgments  like  these,  as  Dr. 
Weir  Mitchell  records,  are  those  which  are 
constantly  made  by  those  who  forget  the 
slow,  orderly  processes  by  which  some  lives 
unfold,  and  pass  step  by  step  from  the 
experiences  of  youth  to  maturity  by  changes 
which  are  wholly  within  and  are  little  due 
to  influences  without.  Rejecting  every  other 
offer,  passing  by  the  tempting  opening  which 
lay  before  him  in  a  day  when  the  disparity  of 
life  and  opportunity  between  the  old  world 
and  the  new  was  great,  as  it  is  not  today,  he 
sought  the  calling  of  his  father,  and  he  sought 
it,  undoubtedly,  because  his  father  had  placed 
it  before  him;  not  in  precept,  but  in  example; 
not  in  injunction,  but  in  life;  and  he  entered 
upon  the  practice  of  his  profession  with  three 

84 


periods  before  him.  For  a  score  of  years  he 
was  to  struggle  with  an  arduous  family 
practice  in  a  town  still  small.  For  another 
score  of  years  he  was  to  be  known  to  all  the 
world  as  a  man  who  had  added  to  the  re- 
sources of  medicine,  and  had  made  a  great 
field  so  completely  his  own  that  he  turned 
the  course  of  medicine  with  its  boundaries 
as  the  foot  of  the  husbandman  turns  the 
rivers  of  water;  and  for  twenty  years  more 
he  was  to  be  a  man  known  in  our  world's 
large  affairs,  to  be  a  figure  in  its  important 
phases.  In  many  fields  he  had  sown  seed  and 
from  each  had  reaped  some  harvest  which 
shall  remain. 

There  is  a  Hindu  saying  that  a  man  should 
be  for  twenty  years  a  soldier,  for  twenty  a 
statesman,  and  that  for  twenty  years  he  should 
be  a  sage,  sought  for  his  wisdom.  And  as  we 
look  upon  that  life  we  realize  that  the  Hindu 
was  right.  For  twenty  years  the  man  we  love 
fought — for  a  practice  and  a  livelihood;  for 
twenty  years  his  opinion  guided  a  great  call- 
ing and  led  in  civil  life  and  the  larger  issues 

85 


of  his  day,  and  for  twenty  years  he  sat  as  a 
man  whom  all  men  sought  and  found  there 
the  wisdom  which  made  clear  to  them  why 
the  Greek  had  found  in  Apollo — the  god  of 
wisdom  and  the  god  of  healing. 

Of  those  who  are  here,  save  a  number  so 
small  they  might  all  be  seated  behind  me  in 
the  spare  seats  of  this  platform,  none  knew 
him  in  those  days  of  a  family  practice.  Those 
who  knew  his  life  of  abounding  success,  of 
the  abounding  endowment  of  a  learning  that 
encompassed  all  and  flowed  in  many  channels 
— medicine,  science,  education,  philosophy — 
forget  those  arduous  years  in  which,  year  by 
year,  he  struggled  for  the  meager  dole  of  the 
practitioner.  It  is  recorded  in  his  autobi- 
ography that  in  the  ten  years  after  he  began 
the  practice  of  medicine  his  receipts  in  the 
year  were  only  a  thousand  dollars,  and  in 
that  year  he  had  suddenly  thrown  upon  him 
the  responsibility  of  caring  for  his  father's 
family  and  was  approaching  his  own  mar- 
riage. There  were  days,  he  records,  in 
which,  besides  his  office  hours,  he  paid  half  a 

86 


hundred  visits,  and  there  was  no  field  for  the 
family  practitioner  in  the  small  town  from 
which  he  stood  apart.  He  shared  in  labors 
which  today  are  almost  exclusively  the  work 
of  the  specialist,  and  through  those  years 
he  continued  the  writing,  the  discovery, 
the  study  which  was  to  mark  all  his  days. 
I  know  of  nothing,  as  the  records  of  this 
meeting  are  printed  in  one  medical  paper 
and  another,  likely  to  bear  more  fruit  and 
encourage  more  those  who  are  in  the  begin- 
ning of  their  work,  than  a  knowledge  of  the 
obstacles  which  he  faced  and  overcame. 

The  Civil  War  came  and  opened  to  him,  as 
it  opened  to  many,  the  door  of  opportunity; 
and  it  also  took  lives  dear  to  him.  The  early 
hope  of  his  life  was  closed  in  death.  He  passed 
through  these  arduous  years  to  find,  as  men 
often  do,  that  the  patient  toil  which  he  had 
given  to  the  case  of  one  soldier  and  another 
smitten  by  nervous  maladies  had  spread  his 
name  abroad.  We  turn  to  the  record  of  his  auto- 
biography for  this  and  learn  that  the  knowl- 
edge of  his  work  and  skill  had  gone  to  hamlets 

87 


and  towns  where  he  could  never  have  gone — 
and  a  wide  public  came  to  know  that  the 
practitioner's  life  had  fruited  in  assuaging 
affections  dependent  upon  the  nerves.  There 
flowed  in  upon  him,  as  a  result  of  the  scientific, 
intelligent  use  of  large  opportunity,  such  a 
practice  as  changed  his  life,  and  the  income 
which  had  been  so  small  in  these  days  of 
struggle  rose  to  figures  which  even  in  this 
day  would  be  large,  and  there  began  for  him 
that  wider  life  and  larger  usefulness  which 
we  all  know. 

The  best  known  use  he  made  of  this  new 
freedom  was  in  medical  research  and  dis- 
covery, but  tonight  I  am  not  sure  but  that 
the  best  use  which  he  made  of  it  was  to 
divide  his  work  year,  and  to  give  half  of  it  to 
what  he  loved  to  call  the  playground  of  the 
mind.  Past  four-score  years,  his  natural  skill 
was  unabated  and  his  mind  still  full  of 
suggestion,  because  he  was  wise  enough  to 
part,  as  he  once  told  me,  with  half  his  pro- 
fessional income  that  he  might  enjoy  the 
kingdom  of  the  mind.    And  this  greater  life — 


the  kingdom  of  the  mind — was  worth  the 
surrendering  for  half  a  year  of  the  most 
jealous  of  callings  and  the  most  exacting  of 
occupations.  He  passed  on  through  all  the 
years  blossoming  in  discovery,  always  in  the 
same  mental  attitude. 

The  character  of  his  discovery  I  leave  to 
him  who  succeeds  me,  able  both  to  record 
and  to  judge;  and  later  one  more  skilled  but 
not  more  affectionate  or  admiring  will  speak 
to  us  of  Dr.  Mitchell's  work  in  letters  as  can 
only  a  craftsman  versed  and  known  in  our 
literature. 

This  rich  and  manifold  career,  child  and 
pattern  of  the  spacious  Renaissance  rather 
than  of  our  own  specialized  days,  added  to 
medicine,  letters,  affairs,  and  the  fine  art 
of  friendship,  the  capacity  for  organization 
which  has  always  marked  and  mastered  the 
loftier  labors  of  this  city.  Franklin  left 
behind  him  a  parterre  of  institutions.  Three 
of  the  six  which  send  their  delegations  here 
tonight  are  of  his  planting,  and  these  are  a 
scant    third  of   the    full    list    of   those    still 

89 


in     existence    which    that    great     journaHst 
began. 

A  century  ago  Philadelphia  was  the  centre 
of  the  early  organization  of  science  in  this 
country,  and  the  first  beginning  of  special 
organized  charity  was  here.  Here  a  Shakes- 
peare society  was  first  organized,  with  which 
Dr.  Mitchell  was  long  associated.  He  was 
conspicuous  in  organizing  and  directing  the 
first  of  the  great  Sanitary  fairs  during  the 
Civil  War.  Of  his  share  in  organizing  the 
observation  of  the  medical  experience  of  that 
struggle  another  speaks,  and  of  his  part  in 
hospital  organization.  The  scientific  con- 
tact of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania  with 
medical  problems  he  did  much  to  organize, 
beginning  what  was  then  new  in  our  higher 
education.  His  early  election  to  the  National 
Academy  of  Science  brought  him  in  close 
relation  to  the  widening  field  of  biological 
research,  and  here  again  there  came  call  for 
his  capacity  for  organizing  and  directing, 
suggesting  and  illuminating  the  experiments, 
investigations,  and  conclusions  of  others.    To 

90 


the  very  close  of  his  life  he  kept  his  marvel- 
ous power  of  original  suggestion  and  the 
vision  for  coming  problems.  The  man  who 
sixty  years  ago  was  busy  at  the  opening  of 
his  professional  life  with  the  new  problems  in 
the  nervous  system  of  man,  in  the  month 
before  he  died  was  aglow  with  experiment 
over  analogous  problems  in  the  structure  and 
action  of  plants. 

This  long  association  with  the  direction 
and  reorganization  of  research  and  discovery 
in  science  led  by  natural  steps  to  his  ser- 
vice in  the  Carnegie  Institution  of  Washing- 
ton. From  its  first  beginning  to  his  death 
he  was  on  its  executive  committee,  and  it 
was  due  to  his  suggestion  and  to  his  wide 
sympathy  with  the  sciences  which  draw  near 
to  the  humanities  that  the  Carnegie  Insti- 
tution published  the  one  continuous  manu- 
script in  existence  of  the  Arthurian  cycle, 
turned  to  the  archeology  of  Central  Asia,  laid 
the  student  of  Chaucer  under  a  lasting  debt, 
and  at  many  points  reorganized  the  science 
of  learning  as  well  as  the  learning  of  science. 

91 


For  an  instant  let  us  remember  that  his 
discoveries  came  by  a  certain  action  of  his 
mind:  A  man  brings  to  his  door  a  box  of 
rattlesnakes  for  sale — of  all  wares,  least 
likely  to  increase  wisdom  and  discovery — 
and  he  takes  them  in,  and  for  two  score 
years  there  run  the  series  of  investigations 
which  would  unravel  the  secret  of  venom 
which  had  appalled  primitive  man  and  had 
remained  unknown  through  all  the  centuries 
of  civilization.  He  is  on  a  vacation  and 
with  no  laboratory — there  are  some  men  who 
are  their  own  laboratories,  as  was  he — no 
material  but  a  turtle;  no  tool  but  his  pocket 
lancet,  and  he  makes  the  discovery  of  a 
chiasm  in  the  turtle,  and  a  new  link  is  forged 
in  the  long  chain  of  evolution,  as  the  whole 
line  of  medicine  moves  along  the  line  of  its 
discovery  and  seeks  to  place  each  human 
being  in  the  environment  in  which  life  forces 
.can  act  and  trust  to  them  for  the  symmetry, 
growth,  and  progress  alike  of  the  individual 
and  of  society. 

This  mind,  which  was  perpetually  seeing 

92 


all  new  relations,  had  in  its  methods  simple, 
fundamental  principles  of  daily  action — the 
astonishing  order,  the  amazing  precision,  the 
enduring  punctuality,  the  perpetual  readiness 
for  every  future  event  days  and  weeks 
before  its  dawn.  These  are  the  foundation 
of  a  great  life.  Without  them  it  will  remain 
bent  by  every  storm  and  buffeted  by  every 
hap  and  mishap  which  comes  and  finds  it 
unprepared. 

I  doubt  whether  in  all  our  American  life 
there  were  any  for  whom  social  life  so  blos- 
somed, who  so  succeeded  in  raising  the 
level  of  average  converse  until  it  felt  the 
motion  of  the  stars  and  knew  the  depth 
of  the  universe.  Never  was  there  a  man  who 
so  cherished  the  art  of  friendship,  so  practised 
it,  so  knew  all  its  ranging,  and  who  perpetu- 
ally was  ready,  if  another  failed  or  forgot,  to 
forgive  and  to  act. 

At  this  hour,  as  we  turn  in  memory  to 
these  things,  each  of  us  is  aware  that  while 
we  had  known  what  his  loss  would  be,  we  did 
not  realize  that  when  it  came  it  would  leave 

93 


us  wanderers  on  a  lonely  road  from  which  the 
light  had  gone. 

As  I  have  said,  I  speak  neither  of  his  work 
in  letters  nor  in  scientific  discovery  of  what 
he  found,  wrote,  and  published.  Let  me 
speak  instead  of  the  men  he  discovered  and 
published.  The  world  will  know  the  books  he 
has  written,  but  not  all  will  know  the  men 
he  has  helped.  There  were  those  to  whom 
he  gave  the  inspiration  of  life.  He  gave  ideas 
as  the  sun,  light.  He  made  life  seem  a  larger 
and  a  newer  thing;  he  developed  it  to  new 
inspiration.  And  I  appeal  to  the  memory 
of  all  those  to  whom  I  speak — here  and  there 
I  see  a  familiar  face  and  see  it  kindled  with 
these  memories — if  it  were  not  true  that  life*s 
paramount  desire  was  to  be  worthy  of  his 
advice  and  to  be  equal  to  his  anticipation? 


94 


The  President:  The  next  tribute  will  be  paid 
by  Dr.  William  H.  Welch,  of  Johns  Hopkins 
University,  President  of  the  National  Academy  of 
Sciences,  long  friend  and  co-worker  in  the  common 
field  of  biological  research  as  applied  to  practical 
medicine. 


95 


S.  WEIR  MITCHELL 
Physician  and  Man  of  Science 

By  Dr.  William  H.  Welch 


97 


DEEP  as  is  our  sense  of  loss  upon  the 
passing  of  one  who  has  been  these  many 
years  the  foremost  figure  in  American  medi- 
cine, the  dominant  feeling  on  this  occasion 
must  be  one  of  exultation  over  a  life  of  well 
nigh  fourscore  years  and  five,  marvellously 
rich  in  varied  achievement  in  medicine  and 
letters,  beneficent  and  enduring  in  influence, 
and  closing  with  mental  vigor  and  activity 
unimpaired  until  that  brief  last  attack  of  the 
disease  which  has  been  called  ^^the  friend  of 
the  aged." 

It  has  fallen  to  me  on  this  occasion  to  pay 
tribute  to  Dr.  Mitchell  as  physician  and  man 
of  science — the  larger  and  more  important 
side  of  his  life  and  work.  I  esteem  this 
opportunity  a  precious  privilege,  imperfectly 
as  I  shall  be  able  to  meet  its  obligations, 
for  his  friendship  has  been  to  me,  as  to 
many  others,  a  dear  possession  and  a  strong 
influence. 

Fortunate  and  necessary  as  it  is  that 
different  speakers  should  present  different 
aspects   of   MitchelFs   Hfe   and   work,   there 

99 


must  enter  into  the  picture  drawn  by  each 
the  whole  man.  No  estimate  of  his  medical 
work  can  leave  out  of  account  the  remark- 
able personality:  the  traits  of  mind,  of  heart, 
of  hand ;  the  genius  for  friendship ;  the  power 
to  stimulate  and  inspire  others;  the  setting 
of  time,  environment,  and  opportunity.  His 
literary  works  have  much  of  circumstance, 
color,  insight,  and  knowledge  which  came  to 
him  as  a  physician,  and  not  a  little  of  his 
medical  writing  has  the  charm  and  power  of 
literature.  We,  of  his  profession,  should  not 
be  willing  to  relinquish  all  claim  to  Dr,  North 
and  His  Friends  or  to  The  Autobiography  of 
a  Quack  and  the  Case  of  George  DedloWy  or  to 
some  of  the  poems,  as  The  Birth  and  Death 
of  Pain,  A  Doctor's  Century,  The  Physician, 
and  others  read  on  medical  occasions.  Many 
of  his  novels  contain  descriptions  of  doctors, 
patients,  epidemics,  and  historical  events 
which  are  of  distinct  medical  interest  and 
value. 

Weir    Mitcheirs    medical    education    was 
such  as  was  customary  at   the  time  and   in 

100 


no  way  remarkable.  Leaving,  in  1848,  on 
account  of  illness  the  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania in  the  senior  year  of  his  college 
course,  he  received,  after  two  years  of  study 
at  the  Jefferson  Medical  College,  his  degree  of 
doctor  of  medicine  in  1850,  his  graduating 
thesis  being  on  **The  Intestinal  Gases/' 
One  of  the  two  hundred  and  eleven  members 
of  his  class  was  his  friend  and  co-worker, 
George  R.  Morehouse.  The  members  of  the 
faculty  at  that  time  were  among  the  leading 
men  of  the  profession,  whose  names  are  still 
remembered:  John  K.  Mitchell,  Dunglison, 
Houston,  Pancoast,  Mutter,  Charles  D.  Meigs, 
and  Franklin  Bache.  Such  teachers  must 
have  done  much  to  compensate  for  the 
defects  in  the  system  of  medical  education 
then  existing  in  this  country,  and  they  help 
to  explain  why  the  results  were  so  much 
better  than  the  system.  Young  Mitchell's 
work  in  analytical  chemistry  in  the  spring 
and  summer  for  two  years  and  a  few  months 
in   Brown's  drug  store   must   have  afforded 

valuable  training  in  accuracy. 

101 


It  is  indeed  startling  to  find  in  some  rough 
autobiographical  notes  left  by  Weir  Mitchell, 
for  extracts  from  which  I  am  indebted  to  his 
son,  Dr.  John  K.  Mitchell,  Jr.,  the  statement 
of  the  father,  Dr.  John  K.  Mitchell:  ''You 
are  wanting  in  nearly  all  the  qualities  that 
go  to  make  success  in  medicine.  You  have 
brains  enough,  but  no  industry.''  Then 
follows  the  comment:  ''He  was  correct 
enough.     I  developed  late.*' 

Another  interesting  note  reads:  "Surgery, 
which  was  my  father's  desire  for  me,  was  hor- 
rible to  me.  I  fainted  so  often  at  operations 
that  I  began  to  despair — but  by  assisting  at 
the  surgical  clinics  I  overcame  by  degrees 
my  horror  of  blood  and  pain."  Mitchell's 
experience  as  a  student  in  this  regard  is  not 
uncommon,  and  affords  no  more  indication 
as  to  fitness  for  the  profession  of  physician  or 
surgeon  than  does  the  lack  of  susceptibility 
to  such  sensations. 

The  year  of  medical  study  in  Paris  in  1851- 

1852,  although  much  interrupted  by  illness, 

was  a  broadening  experience.     Here  he  took 

102 


courses  designed  for  surgical  training,  evi- 
dently keeping  in  view  his  father's  desire,  but 
he  adds  in  the  autobiographical  notes:  '*I 
liked  better  the  lessons  of  Bernard  in  physi- 
ology and  of  Robin  in  microscopy."  To  both 
of  these  great  teachers  and  investigators 
Mitchell  has  expressed  his  indebtedness.  Of 
the  former  he  says  in  his  memoir  of  Dalton: 
''Bernard  strongly  influenced  the  men  who 
sought  his  courses,  and  I  for  one,  like  Dalton, 
must  gladly  acknowledge  the  educative  power 
of  this  sturdy  genius.'' 

The  greatest  educative  influence,  however, 
upon  Weir  Mitchell  was  unquestionably  that 
of  his  distinguished  father,  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  and  original  physicians  in  the 
medical  history  of  this  country.  Of  him  the 
son  writes  in  the  notes  to  which  I  have 
referred:  ''My  father  was  the  best  physician 
I  ever  knew.  He  never  failed  in  resource, 
and  always  had  something  in  reserve.  Also 
for  carefulness,  watchful  attention,  and  swift 
decisions  he  has  no  equal  in  my  memory." 
There   are   remarkable    similarities   between 

103 


father  and  son.  Dr.  John  K.  Mitchell,  the 
elder,  was  a  handsome  man  of  social  gifts, 
an  acute  observer  and  reasoner,  an  experi- 
mentalist, broadly  interested  in  natural 
science,  endowed  with  the  scientific  imagina- 
tion, a  distinguished  physician  and  teacher, 
who  also  wrote  verse.  He  said,  as  well  as 
Henle,  all  that  could  at  the  time  be  said  in 
support  of  the  germ  theory  of  malarial  and 
other  fevers,  and  anticipated  modern  theories 
of  immunity.  The  son  has  rescued  from 
oblivion  his  father's  account  of  the  spinal 
arthropathies,  clouded,  though  it  is,  by 
some  unfortunate  speculations  and  generali- 
zations. 

The  decade  following  Weir  Mitchell's  re- 
turn from  Europe  was  devoted  to  a  growing, 
but  not  too  engrossing  general  practice,  which 
left  time  for  those  experimental  investigations 
in  physiology,  pharmacology,  and  toxicology 
which  laid  the  foundations  of  his  fame  in 
experimental  science.  He  was  the  first  con- 
spicuous example  in  this  country  of  a  medi- 
cal  reputation   and   career  based   upon  and 

104 


determined  largely  by  the  devotion  of  the 
early  professional  years  to  the  kind  of  work 
which  we  now  call  laboratory  work,  although 
there  were  no  medical  laboratories  then  in 
America. 

In  his  address  before  the  Medical  and 
Chirurgical  Faculty  of  Maryland  in  1877, 
Mitchell,  while  speaking  of  the  value  of 
such  work  in  the  training  of  the  physician, 
evidently  draws  from  his  own  experience 
when  he  says:  '*You  ask  me  where,  among 
medical  men,  we  are  to  find  those  who  have 
leisure  for  the  work  of  the  laboratory  and 
for  its  side  of  scientific  therapeutics.  And  to 
this  I  answer,  there  are  long  years  of  but 
partial  occupation  in  the  early  life  of  every 
physician  in  which  he  can  find  ample  time 
for  such  employment.  Will  it  help  or  hurt 
him  in  his  after  life?  The  day  has  gone  when 
a  man  may  dare  to  be  just  only  a  pre- 
scribing doctor.  It  has  gone,  I  trust,  forever. 
Many  years  ago  the  late  Prof.  Samuel  Jack- 
son said  to  me  most  earnestly,  'If  you  want 
to  practise  medicine,  do  not  venture  to  be  an 

105 


experimental  physiologist.  It  will  ruin  you/ 
I  did  not  take  his  advice;  and  I  dare  now  to 
counsel  any  young  and  able  man  among  you 
that  to  spend  a  few  years  in  such  work  is  not 
only  to  give  himself  the  best  of  intellectual 
training,  but  is  also  one  of  the  best  means 
of  advancing  himself  and  fortifying  his  posi- 
tion when  by  degrees  he  becomes  absorbed  in 
clinical  pursuits  and  daily  practice/'  These 
words  are  as  true  today  as  when  they  were 
spoken. 

At  the  time  when  Mitchell  began  his 
professional  career  the  Academy  of  Natural 
Sciences,  instituted  in  1812,  was  the  most 
active  centre  of  scientific  work  in  Philadelphia. 
He  was  elected  a  member  of  this  body  in 
September,  1853,  and  two  months  later  he 
read  before  the  Academy  his  second  published 
paper  entitled,  ''On  the  Influence  of  Some 
States  of  Respiration  upon  the  Pulse,"  which 
was  published  in  abstract  in  the  Proceedings  of 
the  Academy  and  in  full  the  following  year  in 
The  American  Journal  of  the  Medical  Sciences. 
As  early  as  January,  1855,  he  finds  his  char- 

106 


acteristic  place  as  a  member  of  the  library 
committee. 

Up  to  this  time  the  contributions  to  the 
Academy  had  been  mainly  in  the  fields  of 
descriptive  and  systematic  zoology,  botany, 
geology,  and  anthropology,  but  there  now 
appeared  a  small  group  of  young  investigators 
interested  in  the  experimental  biological 
sciences.  They  established  the  short-lived 
Philadelphia  Biological  Society,  which  served 
its  main  purpose  in  leading  the  more  conser- 
vative members  to  agree  to  the  creation  of 
a  Biological  Department  of  the  Academy 
in  March,  1858.  Mitchell  with  Leidy,  Ham- 
mond, Woodward,  Morehouse,  Hays,  Harts- 
horne,  Atlee,  J.  A.  Meigs,  Morris  and 
others  were  among  the  petitioners  for  the 
organization  of  this  department.  Leidy  was 
the  first  director,  William  A.  Hammond  the 
vice-director,  and  Mitchell  was  on  the  physio- 
logical committee,  the  following  year  succeed- 
ing to  the  vice-directorship,  Leidy  remaining 
in  office. 

At  the  first  meeting,  in  April,  1858,  of  the 

107 


Biological  Department,  Mitchell  presented 
the  first  paper  on  *' Blood  Crystals  of  the 
Sturgeon/'  with  colored  plates,  and  early  the 
following  year  he  again  reported  on  blood 
crystals.  It  is  interesting  to  recall  how  this 
early  interest  was  renewed  in  recent  years  by 
the  great  work  of  Reichert  on  the  crystal- 
lography of  hemoglobin,  which  Mitchell  did 
so  much  to  further. 

In  1854,  and  for  several  years  following, 
Mitchell  was  lecturer  upon  physiology  in  the 
Philadelphia  Association  for  Medical  Instruc- 
tion, an  organization  for  extra-mural  teaching 
of  a  type  for  which  the  city  of  Philadelphia 
was  once  famous. 

In  1857,  Mitchell  was  one  of  the  founders 
of  the  Pathological  Society,  to  which  he 
presented  the  first  specimen,  of  which  he 
reminds  us  in  his  toast  to  the  surviving 
members  at  the  dinner  commemorating  the 
fiftieth  anniversary  of  the  society. 

If  it  be  true,  as  he  tells  us,  that  he  was  late 
in  developing — and  I  can  scarcely  credit  it — 
he  had  by  his  twenty-eighth  year  surely  and 

108 


fully  arrived.  One  would  like  a  pen  picture 
from  a  competent  contemporary  of  this 
period,  but  the  record  suffices  to  show  the 
ardor,  the  industry,  the  fertility,  the  truly 
scientific  spirit  of  the  student  of  nature — 
qualities  which  remained  undimmed  until 
the  end. 

Preceding  the  turning  point  in  Mitchell's 
career,  in  1863,  when  he  assumed  medical 
charge  of  an  army  hospital  for  nervous 
diseases,  he  had  published  not  less  than 
twenty-two  medical  papers  and  reports,  none 
of  them  clinical  and  nearly  all  in  the  domains 
of  physiology,  pharmacology,  and  toxicology. 
The  first  was  in  1852  on  the  '/Generation  of 
Uric  Acid'';  all  but  three  fell  within  the  years 
1858  to  1863  inclusive.  The  most  important 
of  these  early  publications,  three  being  in 
association  with  Hammond  and  one  with 
Morehouse,  were  concerned  with  the  com- 
parative anatomy  and  physiology  of  the 
respiratory  and  circulatory  organs,  and  the 
toxicology  of  arrow  and  ordeal  poisons  and 
of  snake  venom.    The  Report  on  the  Progress 

109 


of  Physiology  and  Anatomy,  published  in  1858/ 
is  of  great  value  for  the  student  of  the  history 
of  physiology  in  this  country. 

We  encounter  at  this  early  period  Mitchell's 
singular  faculty  of  observing  and  recording 
certain  curious  phenomena,  some  still  await- 
ing explanation,  such  as  the  production  of 
cataract  in  the  frog  by  the  ingestion  of  cane 
sugar,2  the  effect  of  mechanical  stimulation  of 
muscle,  the  nerve  chiasm  on  the  larynx  of 
turtles,  and  later  the  insusceptibility  of  pigeons 
to  morphine,  and  certain  effects  of  freezing 
parts  of  the  central  nervous  system. 

I  find  also  as  early  as  1858  an  interesting  and 
perhaps  the  first  recorded  example  of  that 
suggestiveness  which  was  such  a  remarkable 
characteristic  of  Mitchell's  mind.  In  Novem- 
ber of  that  year  he  submitted  to  the  Biological 
Department  of  the  Academy  of  Natural 
Sciences  a  proposal  for  a  collective  investiga- 
tion of  the  changes  undergone  by  the  white 

1  American  Medico- Chirurgical  Review,  1858,  ii,  105. 

2  Bernard  a  few  months  before  had  made  the  same  observation, 
but  this  was  then  unknown  to  Mitchell. 

110 


race  in  America  and  outlined  a  tentative 
plan  to  be  followed.  The  proposal  was 
favorably  received  and  Mitchell  was  author- 
ized to  create  a  committee  for  the  purpose. 
I  cannot  find  that  this  interesting  line  of 
investigation,  which  in  recent  years  especially 
has  awakened  renewed  interest,  was  under- 
taken by  Mitchell,  but  he  has  repeatedly 
touched  upon  the  subject  in  his  writings. 

The  most  valuable  of  Mitchell's  publica- 
tions of  the  period  we  are  now  considering 
is  his  monograph  of  one  hundred  and  fifty 
pages  upon  the  venom  of  the  rattlesnake, 
published  in  i860  in  the  Smithsonian  Con- 
trihutions.  Concerning  this  he  says  in  the 
catalogue  of  his  works  printed  in  1894: 
''This  quarto  with  its  many  drawings  was 
the  result  of  four  years  of  such  small  leisure 
as  I  could  spare  amidst  the  cares  of  constantly 
increasing  practice.  The  story  of  the  perils 
and  anxieties  of  this  research,  embarrassed 
by  want  of  help  and  by  its  great  cost,  is 
untold  in  its  pages.     It  was  the  parent  of 

renewed    Indian   researches.     So  far  as   the 

111 


habits,  anatomy,  and  physiology  of  serpents 
are  concerned,  no  one  has  bettered  this 
work.  An  enormous  addition  was  made  in  it 
to  venom  toxicology;  .  .  .  many  ques- 
tions of  antidotes  were  set  at  rest.  It  con- 
tained, of  course,  errors,  now  corrected  in 
the  later  researches  of  its  author,  and  quite 
recently  of  the  author  and  Prof.  Reichert.** 

The  investigation  of  the  venom  of  serpents 
and  its  effects  engaged  the  attention  of 
Mitchell  off  and  on  for  half  a  century,  and 
indeed  had  interested  his  father,  who  trans- 
mitted to  his  son  dried  rattlesnake  venom, 
some  of  which  may  still  be  in  existence.  Of  the 
many  valuable  results  of  this  prolonged  experi- 
mental study,  embodied  in  twelve  papers 
and  monographs,  an  epochal  one  is  the  first 
demonstration  by  Mitchell  and  Reichert,  in 
1883,  of  the  so-called  toxic  albumins,  to  which 
class  belong  not  only  the  snake  venoms  but 
also  certain  plant  and  especially  bacterial 
poisons.  The  later  classical  researches  of 
Flexner      and      Noguchi,      culminating      in 

Noguchi's    fine   volume   on    Snake    Venoms, 

112 


owe  their  inception  to  the  inspiration  and 
support  of  Mitchell,  aided  by  grants  from 
the  Carnegie  Institution.  I  also  owe  to  the 
suggestion  of  Mitchell  a  small  research  under- 
taken in  my  laboratory  by  Major  Ewing,  which 
led  to  the  discovery  of  the  power  of  venom 
to  annul  the  bactericidal  power  of  the  blood, 
thereby  explaining  the  quick  onset  of  putre- 
faction following  death  from  rattlesnake 
venom. 

Mitchell's  interest  and  activity  in  experi- 
mental science  did  not  cease  after  he  became 
identified  with  neurology.  After  1863  he 
published  at  least  ten  physiological  and 
about  twenty-five  pharmacological  and  toxi- 
cological  papers.  In  this  later  period  his 
physiological  researches  were  mainly  in  the 
field  of  neurophysiology,  among  the  more 
important  contributions  being  those  on  the 
physiology  of  the  cerebellum,  in  which  he 
developed  a  view  which  was  practically 
that  advocated,  much  later,  by  Luciani,  on 
cutaneous  nerve  supply,  thus  opening  a  field 
so  successfully  cultivated  in  recent  years  by 

113 


Head  and  others,  and  together  with  Lewis  on 
tendon  jerk  and  muscle  jerk  in  a  series  of 
elaborate  researches  which  have  been  the 
starting  point  for  many  interesting  physio- 
logical and  clinical  studies.  In  Mitchell's 
purely  neurological  writings  are  to  be  found 
many  observations,  facts,  and  conclusions 
which  are  contributions  to  neurophysiology 
as  well  as  to  neuropathology,  such  as  the 
influence  of  nerve  lesions  on  nutrition,  on 
local  temperatures,  on  the  various  senses; 
the  study  of  the  effects  of  freezing  his  own 
ulnar  nerve;  the  observation  of  crossed  par- 
alysis of  the  thermal  sense  without  other 
sensory  loss,  and  his  views  concerning  fatigue 
and  exhaustion  of  nerve  cells  as  the  result 
of  peripheral  irritation. 

I  have  said  these  few  words  concerning 
the  later  physiological  studies  of  Mitchell  in 
order  to  indicate  the  important  position  which 
he  holds  among  the  physiologists  of  this 
country. 

As  the  result  of  an  accident,  fortunate  for 
physiological   science,    it   fell   to   the   lot   of 

114 


Beaumont,  beginning  in  1825,  to  make  a 
series  of  experiments  upon  gastric  digestion 
which  constitute  the  greatest  contribution 
which  America  has  made  to  physiology. 
Dunglison  was  an  admirable  teacher  and 
author,  but  not  an  experimenter.  The  first 
systematic  and  fruitful  cultivators  of  experi- 
mental physiology  in  this  country  were 
Mitchell  and  Dalton,  whose  work  was  prac- 
tically contemporaneous  up  to  the  death  of 
the  latter  in  1889.  My  colleague.  Dr.  Howell, 
a  most  competent  judge,  in  an  unpublished 
paper  upon  the  history  of  American  physi- 
ology, which  he  has  permitted  me  to  read, 
states  that  in  the  period  before  the  estab- 
lishment of  laboratories  by  Bowditch  and 
by  Newell  Martin,  in  the  seventies,  '^probably 
the  most  significant  name  from  the  stand- 
point of  physiological  investigation  is  that  of 
S.  Weir  Mitchell." 

The  creation  of  the  American  Physiological 
Society  in  1887,  which  has  greatly  advanced 
this  science  in  this  country,  was  first  suggested 
by  Mitchell,  who  with  Bowditch  and  Newell 

115 


Martin  signed  the  call  for  the  preliminary 
meeting.  Among  the  many  debts  which 
physiology  owes  to  Weir  Mitchell  should 
not  be  forgotten  his  readiness,  whenever 
needed,  to  come  to  the  defence  of  the  experi- 
mental method  of  research  upon  which 
depends  the  advancement  of  both  the  science 
and  the  art  of  medicine. 

In  1863,  during  the  Civil  War,  came  the 
great  opportunity  which  determined  Mitchell's 
subsequent  career  as  a  neurologist.  For  the 
first  time  in  the  history  of  warfare  a  number 
of  military  hospitals  or  wards  were  estab- 
lished by  Surgeon-General  Hammond  for 
the  study  and  treatment  of  special  diseases 
and  injuries  incident  to  war.  Mitchell  and 
Morehouse,  then  acting  assistant-surgeons, 
were  placed  in  medical  charge  of  the  hospital 
for  nervous  diseases  and  injuries,  located 
first  in  Christian  Street  and  later  in  Turner's 
Lane,  Philadelphia.  It  was  Mitchell  who  sug- 
gested the  establishment  of  this  hospital,  and 
secured  the  appointment  as  junior  assistant 
of  William  W.  Keen,  then  assistant-surgeon, 

116 


and  his  most  efficient,  devoted,  and  zealous 
co-worker. 

The  inspiring  story  of  those  days  has  been 
vividly  told  in  this  hall  by  Mitchell  and 
Keen,  and  I  shall  not  attempt  to  rehearse  it. 
One  is  reminded  of  the  almost  feverish 
activities  of  the  young  Bichat  in  the  Hotel 
Dieu  by  the  work,  until  late  hours  of  the 
night,  of  these  three  ardent  investigators, 
minutely  observing  and  recording  in  thous- 
ands of  pages  of  notes  phenomena  often  both 
new  and  interesting,  analyzing,  conferring, 
apportioning  to  each  his  share  in  working 
up  the  results.  The  opportunity  was  unique, 
and  they  seized  it  with  full  realization  and 
utilization  of  its  possibilities.  ^'I  think,'* 
said  Dr.  Mitchell  a  few  years  ago  in  his 
''toast"  to  the  members  of  the  Pathological 
Society,  ''we  used  well  the  terrible  oppor- 
tunities of  those  bloody  sixties,  and  if  you 
are  today  as  enthusiastic,  as  industrious, 
and  as  fertile,  you  are  to  be  congratulated." 

Beginning  with  Circular  No.  6,  on  "Reflex 

Paralysis, "  issued  from  the  Surgeon-General's 

117 


Office  in  March,  1864,  there  followed  a 
series  of  joint  publications,  the  most  impor- 
tant being  the  memorable  volume  on  Gun- 
shot Wounds  and  Other  Injuries  of  Nerves, 
(1864).  That  on  ''Malingering"  (1865),  and 
the  experimental  part  of  the  paper  on  the 
"Antagonism  of  Morphia  and  Atropia,"  both 
interesting  and  valuable  contributions,  were 
mainly  the  work  of  Keen. 

In  1872  Mitchell  gathered  together  his  ob- 
servations, experiments,  and  conclusions  in  the 
largest  and,  in  my  judgment,  the  most  signifi- 
cant and  important  of  all  his  medical  writings, 
the  book  entitled  Injuries  of  Nerves  and  Their 
Consequences,  to  which  a  valuable  addition 
was  made  by  his  son,  Dr.  John  K.  Mitchell, 
in  a  volume  published  in  1895  containing  the 
subsequent  histories  of  the  surviving  patients 
with  additional  illustrative  cases.  The  study 
and  description  of  peripheral  nerve  phe- 
nomena, especially  those  resulting  from  injury, 
constitute  the  largest,  most  original,  distinc- 
tive, and  important  contribution  of  Weir 
Mitchell  to  neurology,  and  in  this  narrower 

118 


field  his  work  is  comparable  to  that  of 
Duchenne  and  of  Charcot  upon  diseases  of 
the  spinal  cord. 

The  lean  years  and  the  period  of  hard 
struggle  were  now  over.  After  the  war 
Mitchell  rapidly  became  and  afterward  re- 
mained the  leading  neurologist  of  America, 
and  one  of  the  most  distinguished  in  the 
world.  In  1870  he  was  instrumental  in 
establishing  the  Infirmary  for  Nervous 
Diseases  as  a  part  of  the  Orthopedic  Hospital, 
an  institution  which  he  has  made  famous. 
Here  he  found  ample  material  for  clinical 
study,  and  here  for  over  forty  years  he 
taught  and  worked  and  created  a  school  of 
able  investigators  and  clinicians  who  have 
brought  renown  to  American  medicine. 

The  mere  enumeration  of  Mitchell's  discov- 
eries and  original  observations  in  neurology 
— such  as  of  postparalytic  chorea;  erythro- 
melalgia;  the  reflex  disorders  due  to  eye-strain, 
in  which  he  was  aided  by  William  Thomson; 
the  unilateral  hard  edema  of  hysterical  hemi- 
plegia; the  relation  of  pain  to  weather,  and 

119 


others — affords  no  adequate  conception  of  the 
extent  and  value  of  his  work  in  this  field. 
We  shall  all  agree  with  Dr.  Charles  K.  Mills, 
who  with  competent  hand  has  set  forth 
recently  a  brief  summary  and  appreciation, 
that  a  ''thorough  and  elaborate  study  of 
his  neurological  contributions  is  due  to  his 
memory.'*  This  will  be  no  easy  task  and 
will  require  much  time,  labor,  and  expert 
knowledge,  so  prolific  was  MitchelFs  pen 
and  so  suggestive,  at  times  almost  elusive, 
are  thoughts  and  observations  found  often 
in  a  few  sentences,  sometimes  a  single  one. 
I  have  collected  two  hundred  and  forty- 
six  references  to  books,  papers,  and  reports  by 
Mitchell  from  the  Index  MedicuSy  the  Index 
Catalogue  J  medical  journals,  and  his  printed 
catalogue,  which  is  incomplete  even  for  the 
period  covered,  and  I  have  no  doubt  the  list 
exceeds  two  hundred  and  fifty.  I  classify 
one  hundred  and  nineteen  of  these  as 
neurological  and  fifty-two  as  physiological, 
pharmacological,  and  toxicological,  the  re- 
mainder being  addresses  and  historical,  bio- 

120 


graphical,  pathological,  and  miscellaneous 
medical   papers. 

One  of  Mitchell's  fascinating  characteristics 
was  his  interest  in  and  study  of  certain  curious, 
out-of-the-way  phenomena,  often  of  as  much 
psychological  as  neurological  interest.  His 
descriptions  of  ailurophobia,  or  cat-fear,  of 
disorders  of  sleep,  and  of  certain  peculiar 
functional  neurotic  disorders  may  be  cited 
as  examples. 

With  what  felicity  of  style,  with  what  magic 
touch,  with  what  lucid  and  sharp  delineation 
did  Mitchell  often  adorn  his  medical  writings! 
Definitions  of  medical  terms  are  not  often  set 
forth  in  such  words  as  these:  '^As  we  are 
falling  asleep  the  senses  fall  from  guard  in 
orderly  and  well-known  succession — this  in- 
terval I  desire  to  label  the  prcedormitium. 
When  we  begin  to  awaken,  and  the  drowsied 
sentinels  again  resume  their  posts,  there  is  a 
changeful  time,  during  which  the  mind  grad- 
ually regains  possession  of  its  powers — this 
interval  I  may  call,  in  like  fashion,  the  post- 
dormitium.'"     Nor  does  one  often  meet  such 

121 


a  description  of  a  sensory  hallucination  as 
this:  ''Nearly  every  man  who  loses  a  limb 
carries  about  with  him  a  constant  or  incon- 
stant phantom  of  the  missing  member,  a 
sensory  ghost  of  that  much  of  himself,  and 
sometimes  a  most  inconvenient  presence, 
faintly  felt  at  times,  but  ready  to  be  called 
up  to  his  perception  by  a  blow,  a  touch,  or  a 
change  of  wind."  Hundreds  of  similar  happy 
phrases  and  descriptions  may  be  found 
throughout  his  medical  writings  and  addresses. 

The  admirably  descriptive  titles  which 
Mitchell  gave  to  his  articles  may  appear  to 
some  a  small  matter,  but  it  will  not  seem  so 
to  the  cataloguer  and  the  searcher  of  medical 
literature.  How  grateful  to  such  a  searcher 
is  this  one  which  only  too  often  would  have 
appeared  under  some  such  rubric  as  ''a  rare 
case:'*  ''Reversals  of  habitual  motions;  back- 
ward pronunciation  of  words;  lip  whispering 
of  the  insane ;  sudden  failures  of  volition ;  repe- 
tition impulses"! 

As  Dr.  Mills  remarks,  "Mitchell  is  one  of 
the  few  neurologists  to  whom  well-deserved 

122 


fame  has  come  because  of  his  contributions 
to  therapeutics."  He  is  doubtless  best  known 
to  the  Jay  public,  as  well  as  to  a  large  part  of 
the  profession,  by  the  introduction  of  that 
method  of  treatment  which  goes  by  his  name, 
and  consists  in  the  systematic  employment 
of  a  number  of  agencies,  chiefly  rest,  seclusion, 
full  feeding,  massage,  and  electricity.  When 
one  considers  the  brilHant  success  of  this 
treatment  in  appropriate  cases  in  the  hands 
of  Mitchell  and  others,  the  immense  literature 
upon  the  subject,  the  direct  and  indirect 
bearings  and  implications  of  the  method,  and 
the  stimulus  which  it  has  given  to  the  study 
and  relief  of  a  large  and  difficult  class  of 
functional  neurotic  disorders,  I  believe  it 
safe  to  say  that  the  introduction  of  this 
Weir  Mitchell  treatment  constitutes  one  of 
the  great  advances  in  therapeutics  of  modern 
times,  and  this  I  say  with  knowledge  of 
diverging  opinions  and   criticisms. 

There  are  many  aspects  of  the  professional 
life  and  work  of  this  extraordinarily  able  and 
versatile  man,  other  than  the  physiological  and 

123 


neurological,  concerning  which  I  should  like 
to  speak,  and  had  expected  to  speak,  did  time 
permit,  such  as  his  valuable  contributions  to 
medical  history,  particularly  in  the  remark- 
able address  on  the  early  history  of  instru- 
mental precision  in  medicine,  the  recollections 
of  the  Civil  War,  and,  above  all,  his  fascinating 
and  even  surprising  additions  to  our  knowledge 
of  Harvey,  whom  he  admired  above  all  men 
of  medicine;  his  public  addresses,  unmatched 
for  style,  charm,  and  interest;  his  instructive 
talks  to  nurses;  his  biographical  memoirs,  like 
that  of  Dalton,  to  which  I  have  referred;  the 
delightful  popular  lectures,  articles,  and  books, 
such  as  Wear  and  Tear,  or  Hints  for  the  Over- 
workedy  which  has  gone  through  many  editions 
since  its  first  appearance  in  1873,  and  the  later 
Doctor  and  Patient;  the  researches  of  others 
stimulated  and  inspired  by  him,  whereby  he 
greatly  multiplied  his  services  to  science  and 
medicine;  the  many  honors  and  recognitions 
which  came  to  him  here  and  abroad,  and 
distinguished  Mitchell  above  all  physicians 
of  America;     his  great  services   to  medical 

124 


education  as  a  member  of  the  Board  of 
Trustees  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania, 
to  whose  great  growth  and  prosperity  he 
contributed  so  largely,  and  other  institutions 
which  he  served  in  a  similar  capacity  might 
also  be  included.  It  is  needless  in  this  hall, 
which  bears  his  name,  and  before  this  audience 
for  me  to  dwell  upon  his  inestimable  services 
to  the  College  of  Physicians  of  Philadelphia, 
of  which  he  became  a  Fellow  in  1856,  and 
which  grew  to  be  one  of  the  dearest  interests 
of  his  life.  Here  his  name  is  perpetuated  and 
here  it  will  ever  be  treasured  as  the  chief  orna- 
ment and  greatest  benefactor  of  the  College. 

Representing  officially  on  this  occasion  the 
National  Academy  of  Sciences,  I  bring  our 
tribute  to  the  memory  of  the  oldest  member 
when  he  died,  his  election,  due  to  his  con- 
tributions to  experimental  science,  dating  from 
1865.  Through  all  these  years  he  had  been  a 
regular  attendant  and  frequent  contributor 
at  the  meetings,  his  presence  here,  as  else- 
where, always  bringing  cheer  and  inspiration. 
He  will  be  sadly  missed  from  our  meetings. 

125 


At  the  fiftieth  anniversary  dinner  of  the 
Academy,  last  spring,  Mitchell  spoke  delight- 
fully of  the  past  history  of  the  Academy,  his 
reminiscences  of  Joseph  Henry  being  particu- 
larly interesting.  At  the  semi-annual  meet- 
ing in  Baltimore,  last  November,  Mitchell  read 
the  biographical  memoir  of  his  most  intimate 
friend  in  the  profession.  Dr.  John  S.  Billings. 
This  memoir  of  a  friend  to  whom,  for  over 
half  a  century,  he  had  been  devotedly  at- 
tached, is  significant  as  the  last  contribution 
of  Weir  Mitchell  to  medical  literature. 

I  am  commissioned  to  speak  also  in  behalf 
of  the  Carnegie  Institution  of  Washington,  of 
which  Mitchell  was  designated  a  trustee  by  the 
founder  in  1902,  and  in  the  development  of 
which  he  was  deeply  interested.  From  the 
beginning  he  was  a  member  of  the  executive 
committee,  and  a  most  diligent  and  active  one. 
He  was  especially  effective  in  the  furtherance 
of  the  biological  work  undertaken  by  the  Insti- 
tution, and  scarcely  less  so  in  other  directions. 
The  Institution  owes  a  large  debt  to  the  wise 
counsel  and  suggestive  mind  of  Weir  Mitchell. 

126 


However  the  verdict  of  history  may  modify 
contemporary  judgments  of  the  achievements 
of  men,  it  cannot  change  the  place  which  Dr. 
Mitchell  holds  in  our  affection  and  esteem. 
He  was  a  great  physician ;  our  leader,  endeared, 
admired;  our  friend  and  counselor,  generous, 
wise,  inspiring;  a  man  of  singular  graces  and 
accomplishments,  active  in  advancing  knowl- 
edge and  in  good  works,  a  poet  and  man  of 
letters,  a  sweetener  of  life  to  both  sick  and 
well.  Happy  such  a  life  and  happy  the  mem- 
ories thereof  which  we  shall  ever  cherish!  As 
he  said  of  Harvey,  we  may  say  of  him — ^Weir 
Mitchell  represented  all  that  is  best  in  the 
physician  and  the  gentleman. 


127 


The  President:  The  third  and  last  address  will 
be  that  of  his  kinsman  and  near  friend,  bound  to 
him  by  the  double  tie  of  blood  and  love  of  letters, 
Mr.  Owen  Wister. 


129 


S.  WEIR  MITCHELL 

Man  of  Letters 

By  Owen  Wister 


131 


ONCE,  some  years  ago,  as  I  was  crossing 
Sixth  Street  at  Chestnut,  an  approaching 
figure  arrested  my  attention.  He  was  ajDOUt 
half  a  square  away,  opposite  the  door  of 
Independence  Hall.  He  was  a  lean  man  with 
a  lean  face,  and  seemed  tall,  vigorous,  alert, 
and  gray.  His  rough  cap  was  gray,  too,  and 
gray  the  longish  cape  that  hung  from  his 
shoulders;  and  distinction  beaconed  from  his 
whole  appearance.  My  curiosity  grew  as  he 
paused  to  contemplate  Independence  Hall.  I 
decided  he  was  a  foreigner  of  note  in  the  same 
second  that  whatever  scales  had  been  on  my 
eyes  fell,  and  I  saw  it  was  Dr.  Mitchell. 

We  met,  spoke  for  a  moment,  then  went  our 
separate  ways ;  but  I  continued  to  think  about 
him.  Owing  to  some  brief  preoccupation,  it 
had  befallen  me  to  see  Dr.  Mitchell  unlahelled; 
but  merely  his  appearance  fifty  yards  off  in 
the  passing  crowd  had  been  label  enough.  In 
my  turn  I  looked  up  at  Independence  Hall. 
''He  and  it  match  each  other  pretty  well,"  I 
thought. 

The   life   he   had   lived   had   chiselled   his 

133 


features  deep  and  fine.  He  had  known  the 
wolf  at  his  door  and  had  driven  him  off;  he 
had  carried  upon  his  shoulders  a  family  heavy 
with  misfortune;  he  had  triumphantly  lived 
down  patronizing  distrust  and  indifference. 
To  have  weathered  hardship  courageously; 
to  have  benefited  mankind  signally;  to  have 
translated  noble  impulses  into  noble  action  all 
one's  life — these  golden  deeds  sculpture  the 
human  countenance  with  golden  scars,  as  Dr. 
Mitchell's  face  was  carved.  What  mark  was 
left  upon  his  books  ?  In  Westways,  his  last 
novel,  Penhallow  has  gone  to  visit  an  indi- 
gent Baptist  preacher;  and  at  the  sight  of  the 
three  shabby  volumes  which  constitute  the 
man's  whole  library,  Penhallow  exclaims 
compassionately:  ''By  George!  that  is  sad. 
The  man  is  book-poor  ...  I  will  ask 
him  to  use  mine."  Dr.  Mitchell  himself  had 
known  the  sadness  of  book-poverty;  when 
book-riches  came  to  him,  he  knew  the  joy 
of  lending  and  giving.  Throughout  his 
tales  are  touches  like  this,  born  of  the 
long,   lean,   hard  years  he  had  lived. 

134 


But  beneath  the  generous  scars  in  Dr. 
Mitchell's  face  lay  something  else,  very 
special,  plainly  to  be  discerned  not  in  him 
alone,  but  in  great  numbers  of  his  generation. 
This  is  the  deepest  mark  of  all,  this  that  he  and 
a  multitude  of  his  fellow-countrymen  bore; 
and  as  it  was  set  upon  the  man,  so  is  it  set 
upon  his  books;  not  one  is  without  it;  it  is 
mingled  with  the  very  essence  of  his  writing. 

Can  not  some  of  you  remember  old  photo- 
graph albums  of  the  sixties?  Have  you  not 
sometimes,  in  some  drawing-room,  while  you 
waited  for  your  hostess  to  come  down  stairs, 
turned  the  leaves  of  such  an  album?  I  can 
think  of  one  now.  Among  its  ancient  faces, 
quaint  in  old  fashions,  are  pictures  of  soldiers 
— ^young  soldiers  generally;  mere  boys  quite 
often.  They  wear  sabres  and  visored  caps 
and  boots  to  their  knees.  Out  of  these  small, 
dim,  carte-de-visite  album  windows  these  boys 
look  at  us  across  fifty  years.  As  we  gaze  at 
them  the  strange  fancy  comes  that,  could 
they  open  their  lips  and  speak,  they  would 
all  say  the  same  thing;    in  their  silence  they 

135 


seem  to  share  something  of  solemn  import. 
Thousands  of  houses  have  such  albums.  If 
the  photographs  were  colored,  some  of  the 
uniforms  would  be  blue,  some  gray,  but  in 
whatever  color  they  are  clad,  the  same  look  is 
in  all  these  boys.  Charleston  and  Richmond 
differ  not  from  Boston  and  Philadelphia.  No 
matter  which  the  uniform  of  the  young  sol- 
diers, the  same  beautiful,  serious  light  shines 
upon  their  faces — the  glow  of  dedication. 
Not  on  soldiers  only  did  the  Civil  War  thus 
set  its  seal,  but  upon  all  patriotic  men  and 
women  also.  And  so  that  generation  saw  a 
vision  that  we  see  not,  and  wrote  with  a  pen 
that  never  can  be  ours.  Fined  in  a  white-hot 
furnace,  it  emerged  with  eyes  which  had  seen 
our  country  battling  for  her  soul  with  naked 
sword.  Through  four  long  years  that  genera- 
tion had  witnessed  this:  how  should  it  not 
thereafter  look  at  the  world,  and  time,  and 
eternity,  with  a  special  gaze  of  its  own?  To 
Dr.  Mitchell  came  hundreds  of  the  maimed 
and  wounded  from  that  conflict.  Wounds, 
blood,  agony,  and  noble  courage  were  for  him 

136 


a  daily  sight.  In  hospitals  he  helped  to  save 
the  men,  or  saw  them  die.  Never  could  he 
be  the  same  again.  Whatever  his  thoughts 
thenceforth,  deep  down  was  that  memory 
perpetual.  During  the  last  five  days  of  his 
illness  his  wandering  mind  returned  to  those 
scenes;  his  wandering  talk  was  of  mutilation 
and  bullets;  he  conversed  and  argued  with 
that  past.  Therefore  it  is  that  when  we  read 
his  tales  and  poems,  no  matter  what  be  their 
subject,  all  come  from  a  spirit  over  which  had 
passed  the  great  vision ;  every  drop  of  ink  is 
tinctured  with  the  blood  of  the  Civil  War. 

More  important  even  than  genius  to  the 
novelist  and  the  poet  is  his  attitude  toward 
life.  We  can  only  mark,  we  cannot  measure, 
the  effect  of  the  Civil  War  upon  Dr.  Mitchell. 
With  this  first  abiding  influence  is  to  be 
counted  one  other,  from  his  forty-sixth  year 
until  the  end — the  voice  which  Stevenson  has 
called  the  Critic  on  the  Hearth.  It  cannot  be 
known  how  much  both  of  discretion  and 
inspiration  he  owed  to  Mary  Cadwalader 
Mitchell,  his  second  wife.    With  her  discern- 

137 


ment,  her  taste,  and  her  right-mindedness 
went  indomitable  courage.  He  called  her  his 
best  critic,  because  she  could  unmercifully 
condemn.  She  also,  therefore,  is  ever  present 
in  all  save  his  earliest  pages. 

He  waited  a  long  while  before  stepping  out 
into  the  open  with  his  first  volume.  While 
still  in  his  twenties  he  had  sent  to  a  Boston 
publisher  a  collection  of  youthful  verse.  This 
was  submitted  to  Dr.  Holmes.  Dr.  Holmes 
advised  the  young  poet  to  hide  Literature  in 
his  desk  until  Medicine  were  full  grown. 
Forty  was  the  age  he  set.  The  poet  waited 
longer,  and  most  of  that  early  verse  was 
burned.  The  poet  was  a  person  who  not 
only  could  give  good  advice,  but  could  take  it. 
He  was  fifty-one  before  a  volume  of  three 
prose  tales,  bearing  his  name  on  its  title-page, 
announced  that  he  had  begun  the  practice 
of  his  second  profession.  He  had  already 
been  practising  it  anonymously  for  some  time. 
About  the  year  1857  some  unsigned  verses 
of  his,  sent  by  his  father  to  a  daily  paper, 
mark  his  first   appearance   in   print.     They 

138 


were  entitled  Herndon,  They  celebrated  this 
sea-captain's  noble  conduct  and  heroic  self- 
sacrifice  in  shipwreck.  The  last  verses  Dr. 
Mitchell  ever  wrote — the  very  last — cele- 
brated the  last  Christmas  that  he  ever  saw. 
Verse  was  his  earliest  utterance — and  his 
farewell;  he  entered  literature  with  a  song 
of  heroism,  he  left  it  singing  to  the  Star  of 
Bethlehem.  Between  these  two  shining  gates 
stretches  a  road  fifty-six  years  long,  marked 
by  more  than  forty  separate  publications  in 
verse  and  prose — thirty-five  of  these  since 
1880. 

The  early  stages  of  this  road  are  naturally 
less  crowded;  Dr.  Mitchell  was  sticking  to 
the  advice  of  Dr.  Holmes,  and  he  was  hard 
at  work  day  and  night  as  a  physician.  On 
December  2,  1861,  the  Rev.  Dr.  William 
H.  Furness  writes  to  his  friend  Emerson: 


My  dear  R.  W.  : 

I  send  you  a  copy  of  some  verses  which,  when 
read  to  me  the  other  day  by  Mrs.  Wister,  struck  me  as 
smooth  and  lively  enough  to  grace  the  pages  of  the 
Atlantic.    They  are  the  work  of  a  young  doctor  here 

139 


who  makes  no  pretences  (Mitchell  by  name;  he 
married  the  only  daughter  of  Alfred  Elwyn,  whom  you 
recollect).  He  does  not  wish  to  put  his  name  to  them. 
So  please  regard  them  as  anonymous.  If  you  think 
them  worthy  will  you  send  them  to  the  editor — I 
don't  know  who  the  editor  is. 

And  Emerson  replies: 

Concord,  13  February. 
My  dear  Friend: 

I  passed  through  Philadelphia  very  sadly  the  other 
day  that  I  could  not  stop  ...  I  was  the  more 
vexed,  because  I  have  hived  some  quite  novel  expe- 
riences at  Washington  for  your  ear.  But  the  instant 
errand  was  to  exculpate  myself  of  neglect  of  your  letter. 
I  had  at  once  carried  the  verses  on  "Strasburg  Clock" 
to  Fields,  who  agreed  to  print  them,  and  they  were 
to  appear  in  the  March  number.  But  something 
hindered  this,  and  they  are,  I  understand,  to  appear 
in  April. 

And  Dr.  Furness  replies: 

February  17,  '62. 
My  dear  Friend: 

Thanks  for  your  kind  care  of  the  "Strasburg  Clock." 
The  author,  an  unpretending  and  right  lovable 
man,  is  son-in-law  of  Alfred  Elwyn,  whom  you  re- 
member. I  was  taken  with  the  verses  partly  because 
they  came  from  so  unexpected  a  quarter. 

140 


That  word  ''unexpected"  throws  Hght  upon 
how  dark  Dr.  Mitchell  was  keeping  verse  in 
his  desk — how  well  he  was  taking  Dr.  Holmes' 
advice. 

The  sinking  of  the  Cumberland^  a  disaster 
of  the  Civil  War,  inspired  him  during  this 
same  year  of  1862  with  a  fine  lyric. 

Gray  swept  the  angry  waves 

O'er  the  gallant  and  the  true, 

Rolled  high  in  mounded  graves 

O'er  the  stately  frigate's  crew — 

Over  cannon,  over  deck. 

Over  all  that  ghastly  wreck — 

When  the  Cumberland  went  down. 

And  forests  old,  that  gave 

A  thousand  years  of  power 

To  her  lordship  of  the  wave 

And  her  beauty's  regal  dower. 

Bent,  as  before  a  blast. 

When  plunged  her  pennoned  mast, 
And  the  Cumberland  went  down. 

And  stern  vikings  that  lay 

A  thousand  years  at  rest, 
In  many  a  deep  blue  bay 

Beneath  the  Baltic's  breast, 
Leaped  on  the  silver  sands 
And  shook  their  rusty  brands^ 

As  the  Cumberland  went  down. 
141 


In  1864,  The  Children's  Hour^  of  which  he 
was  part  author,  and,  later,  FuzbuZy  the  Fly, 
a  second  fairy-book,  were  published,  both  in 
aid  of  the  Sanitary  Commission.  His  next 
experiment  was  a  new  one — he  never  grew 
tired  of  new  experiments — a  tale  in  the 
Atlantic  Monthly  for  July,   1866. 

While  talking  with  his  friend  Mr.  Henry 
Wharton,  about  the  Civil  War  hospitals,  he 
spoke  of  a  man  who,  in  the  fight  at  Mobile 
Bay,  had  lost  both  legs  and  both  arms — and 
survived.  Mr.  Wharton  whimsically  sug- 
gested that  fragments  of  the  torso's  psychic 
self  might  well  have  departed  with  these 
limbs.  From  this  grew  The  Case  of  George 
Dedlow.  While  still  undecided  what  name  to 
give  the  torso,  Dr.  Mitchell  saw  one  day  as 
he  stood  on  a  step  in  Price  Street,  German- 
town,  the  name  Dedlow  on  a  jeweller's  shop 
across  the  way;  and  Dedlow  seemed  to  fit  a 
legless  man.  Like  the  ''Strasburg  Clock*' 
verses,  this  story  was  lent  to  Mrs.  A.  L. 
Wister,  who  showed  it  to  her  father,  the  Rev. 
Dr.  Wm.  H.  Furness.    Without  Dr.  Mitchell's 

142 


knowledge  he  sent  it  to  Edward  Everett  Hale, 
then  editor  of  the  Atlantic  Monthly.  A 
check  for  eighty  dollars,  with  the  proof-sheets, 
was  the  first  that  the  author  knew  of  his 
story's  fate.  It  was  not  the  last  1  Dr.  Mitchell 
had  written  The  Case  of  George  Dedlow  in  a 
strictly  documentary  tone  until  its  fantastic 
conclusion.  This  ought  to  have  undeceived 
any  one.  But  in  the  September  Atlantic 
appeared  a  leading  article  on  the  subject, 
following  which  charitable  checks  began  to 
flow  into  Philadelphia  for  the  relief  of  the 
afllicted  but  wholly  imaginary  torso.  To  trace 
all  the  contributors  proved  impossible,  and 
the  money  thus  remaining  unreturned  was 
given  to  the  Sanitary  Commission. 

In  an  essay  entitled  'Thantom  Limbs,"  pub- 
lished in  1 87 1,  Dr.  Mitchell  seriously  discusses 
a  real  phenomenon  which  never  ceased  to 
interest  the  medical  side  of  his  genius.  To 
this  early  time  belong  three  other  essays, 
*Wear  and  Tear,"  ^'CampCure,"  and  ''Nurse 
and  Patient,"  all  which  their  author  signed; 
he   counted  them  as  doctor's  work,  not  as 

143 


belonging  to  his  second  profession.  To 
literature,  nevertheless,  they  do  also  be- 
long, because  of  their  direct,  agreeable 
style. 

Dr.  Mitchell's  style  in  these  early  medical 
essays  had  benefited  from  the  exercise  of 
making  verse;  from  good  reading;  and  from 
civilized  company  who  possessed  the  tradition 
of  sound  idiomatic  English. 

From  the  printing  of  Herndon,  in  1857, 
until  1880,  he  practised  literature  anony- 
mously, verses  and  tales  being  dotted  along 
through  this  period  more  thickly  as  it  draws 
to  its  close,  most  of  these  being  published  in 
the  Atlantic  Monthly  or  in  Lippincott's  Maga- 
zine. And  now,  medicine  being  entirely 
grown  up,  and  Dr.  Holmes'  advice  faithfully 
obeyed.  Dr.  Mitchell  signed  the  volume 
entitled  Hephzibah  Guiness,  The  first  of  its 
three  tales  turns  upon  the  inheritance  of 
insanity;  its  scene  is  laid  in  Philadelphia,  in 
1807.  Here  is  a  passage  from  it,  at  the  point 
where  the  hero  has  just  learned  of  his  her- 
editary taint,  news  to  him  supremely  terrible, 

144 


because  it  forbids  his  marrying  the  lady  of 
his  heart: 

''His  walk  took  him  along  the  willow  mar- 
gin of  the  river,  and  at  last  across  the  floating 
bridge  at  Gray's  Ferry,  and  so  up  to  the  high 
ground  which  lay  back  of  Woodlands.  At 
first  there  was  in  all  his  heart  a  sea  of  nameless 
passion,  pent  up  for  years,  and  only  set  free  for 
a  moment,  to  be  ordered  at  the  next  into  quiet 
by  a  voice  to  him  as  potent  as  that  which 
stilled  the  raging  waters  of  Galilee.  Then 
came  for  a  while,  or  at  intervals,  that  strange 
sense  of  being  morally  numbed  which  is  like 
the  loss  of  feeling  mercifully  bestowed  on  the 
physical  system  by  the  blow  of  the  lion's  paw. 
At  last,  out  of  the  confusion  order  began  to 
come,  and  painful  capacity  to  study  in  detail 
his  own  sensations,  and  to  look,  though  but 
unsteadily,  at  the  need  for  decision.  Here  also 
he  began  to  take  note  of  outside  things,  and 
to  see  with  curious  intensity  natural  objects, 
from  memories  of  which  would  come  forth  in 
after-days  all  the  large  horror  of  the  sorrow 
to  which  they  had  become  linked  by  Nature's 

145 


mysterious  bonds  of  association.  Thus  he 
noted,  whether  he  would  or  not,  the  miserly 
little  squirrels,  and  the  rustling  autumn  woods 
thick  with  leafy  funerals,  through  which  the 
lated  robin  flew  in  haste.'* 

That  is  a  passage  written  with  the  pen  of 
the  doctor  held  in  the  hand  of  the  poet — it 
reveals  the  writer's  love  of  local  atmosphere, 
from  which  he  drew  so  much  of  his  material, 
early  and  late;  and  an  attitude  toward  life, 
tender,  grave,  religious,  and  seasoned  with 
experience  and  retrospect  as  no  young  man's 
could  possibly  be.  Through  passages  like 
this  the  reader  learns  that  he  is  in  no  ordinary 
presence;  and  whatever  more  of  the  writer's 
art  was  learned  by  its  industrious  exercise  in 
the  many  volumes  to  follow  this  first  one, 
maturity  was  already  here.  Two  years  later, 
in  the  Atlantic  Monthly,  Dr.  Mitchell  pub- 
lished his  first  novel.  In  War  Time.  It  was 
written  at  Newport,  during  the  summer, 
which  season  came  to  be  his  habitual  time 
for  writing  down  the  tales  and  verses  he 
had  been  meditating.     He  wrote  rapidly,  and 

146 


always  with  his  own  hand.  Hugh  Wynne  was 
written  in  six  weeks;  but  he  had  been  seven 
years  studying  and  making  notes  for  it. 

Were  it  not  too  long,  I  should  read  the 
beginning  of  the  fourth  chapter  of  In  War 
Time,  which  dwells  for  two  pages  upon  the 
changes  wrought  upon  the  medical  profession 
by  our  Civil  War.  But  I  quote  some  briefer 
and  very  characteristic  passages,  showing 
again  the  maturity  with  which  these  early 
books  were  written.  In  fact  I  am  tempted  to 
say  that  construction  alone  was  learned  later: 

''No  man  knew  better  than  he  how  to  use 
his  intellect  to  apologize  to  himself  for  lack  of 
strict  obedience  to  the  moral  code  by  which 
his  profession  justly  tests  the  character  of  its 
own  labor."  *'And  wiped  from  his  brow  the 
sweat  which  marks  the  earning  of  death,  as 
of  bread.''  ''Could  we  hear  all  that  is  said 
behind  our  backs,  existence  would  be  nearly 
impossible  except  for  the  few,  who  would  then 
make  what  is  left  of  it  intolerable.''  "There 
are  delicate  overtones  of  unselfishness  which 
belong  only  to  the  purest  and  sweetest  natures 

147 


refined  by  the  truest  good-breeding.  They  are 
the  very  poetry  of  social  conduct/*  These 
comments,  meditative  and  fanciful,  plainly 
herald  those  two  later  books.  Characteristics 
and  Dr,  North  and  His  Friends,  in  which  com- 
ment is  dramatized  and  strung  upon  a  thread 
of  plot. 

In  Dr.  Mitchell's  thirty  or  forty  short 
stories,  plot  is  often  the  main  thing,  and  his 
invention  supplies  it  freely;  in  his  thirteen 
novels,  plot  is  mostly  of  slight  concern,  inter- 
est being  generally  in  analysis  of  character  and 
the  atmosphere  or  the  era  that  he  depicts. 
Sustained  architectural  development,  the 
working  out  of  a  principal  underlying  theme, 
such  as  in  Tom  Jones,  was  not  easy  for  him; 
yet  in  Constance  Trescott  he  achieved  this;  and 
if  symmetry  is  the  gauge  of  excellence,  this 
novel  is  his  best.  He  thought  it  so.  His 
construction  is  apt  to  ramble:  as  in  Francois, 
deliberately,  after  the  picaresque  pattern; 
or  in  a  leisureliness  sometimes  too  casual 
tracing  month  by  month  the  fortunes  of  his 
people.      Violent   events,    such   as   occur   in 

148 


Far  in  the  Forest^  are  outnumbered  by  the  less 
accentuated  features  of  average  existence. 
He  drew  his  material  from  various  sources 
— his  own  memories  of  Pike  County,  of  his 
year  in  Paris,  of  the  hospitals  and  the  War, 
of  New  England  holidays;  and  from  diaries 
and  documents,  as  in  The  Red  City  and  Hugh 
Wynne;  from  anecdotes  told  him  by  friends, 
as  in  Roland  Blake;  and  from  his  medical 
experience.  This  gave  him  most  of  his  pene- 
trating observation  and  some  of  his  person- 
ages. He  drew  but  a  single  portrait  con- 
sciously from  life — his  sister  being  the  original; 
but  he  knew,  as  any  novelist  knows,  that 
every  character  is  distilled  from  the  social 
nourishment  of  the  writer  just  as  directly  as 
our  flesh  and  blood  come  from  the  meals  we 
have  eaten. 

Dr.  Mitchell  never  quite  found  himself  in 
his  dialogue,  which  lacks  the  shading  and 
flexibility  of  nature;  or  yet  in  his  narrative 
prose,  which  often  resembles  the  prose  of 
essay  rather  than  of  fiction;  yet  in  spite  of 
this  and  the  usually  quiet  action  of  his  novels, 

149 


their  success  increased  until  with  Hugh  Wynne 
it  became  a  popular  triumph — and  was  heard 
of  in  Wales,  where  many  real  original  Wynnes 
are  buried.  There,  once,  in  a  graveyard,  the 
sexton  pointed  out  their  tombs  to  Dr.  Mit- 
chell, not  knowing  who  he  was,  and  said  that 
the  present  head  of  the  family  now  lived 
in  America  and  his  name  was  Hugh  Wynne. 

No  tale  of  our  Revolution  has  approached 
it,  or  is  so  well  remembered;  and  thereafter 
a  wide  audience  waited  for  every  new  novel 
by  Dr.  Mitchell. 

They  never  waited  so  for  his  poems;  yet 
in  poetry  his  best  is  to  be  found;  it  holds 
company  with  the  best  our  American  Muse 
has  sung.  His  first  volume  followed  his  first 
novel  in  1883,  and  showed  him  nearer  to  the 
heart  of  verse  than  of  prose.  None  but  a  true 
poet  could  have  written 

"The  perfect  pearls  of  life's  young  dream 
Dissolved  in  manhood's  tears." 

Four  years  later  his  second  volume  led  a 
critic  in  The  Nation  to  say  that  it  seemed  like 

150 


^'the  work  of  a  man  whose  whole  soul  was  in 
the  poetic  art,  and  who  never  had  looked  in 
any  other  intellectual  direction/'  Much  was 
written  after  1887 — The  Cup  of  Youth,  A 
Psalm  of  Deaths,  The  Mother,  The  Wager, 
Pearl,  The  Comfort  of  the  Hills,  Barabhas — 
this  in  his  eighty-fifth  year — enough  in  all  to 
fill  two  volumes,  presently  to  be  published. 
Of  these  he  spoke  to  me  in  the  last  talk  we 
ever  had.  In  his  own  judgment,  Villon, 
Drake,  the  Ode  on  a  Lycian  Tomb,  The  Seagull, 
and  Magnolia  are  his  best.  But  what  an 
industry,  what  a  Hfe!  The  mere  calendar  is 
vertiginous — here  is  a  piece  of  it:  Hugh 
Wynne,  1898;  Adventures  of  Francois,  1899; 
Dr,  North  and  His  Friends,  1900;  The  Wager, 
1900;  Circumstance,  1^01;  When  All  the  Woods 
Are  Green,  1901,  with  seven  articles  and 
lectures  wedged  into  this  same  period — thus 
through  fifty-six  years  grew  a  shelf  of  books 
larger  and  better  that  many  a  writer's  who  has 
done  nothing  else,  and  by  the  side  of  this 
another  shelf  of  medical  works,  and  an  active 
practice,   and    original   research   and   contri- 

151 


butions  to  medical  science  and  treatment,  and 
a  permanent  international  fame!  He  never 
talked  about  the  sacredness  of  labor,  but  the 
joy  of  it.  Winter  and  summer  he  worked — 
him,  fortunately,  the  unions  could  not  control! 
And  because  he  so  loved  work,  thus  could  he 
sing  of  idleness: 

There  is  no  dearer  lover  of  lost  hours 

Than  I. 
I  can  be  idler  than  the  idlest  flowers ; 

More  idly  lie 
Than  noonday  lilies  languidly  afloat, 
And  water  pillowed  in  a  windless  moat. 

And  I  can  be 
Stiller  than  some  gray  stone 
That  hath  no  motion  known. 

It  seems  to  me 
That  my  still  idleness  doth  make  my  own 
All  magic  gifts  of  joy's  simplicity. 

A  city  of  good  doctors  owes  to  the  influence 
of  Dr.  Mitchell  that  high  tone  which  the 
profession  has  maintained  through  an  era  of 
declining  standards.  What  is  our  literature*s 
true  debt  to  him? 

I  cannot  suppose  that  I  am  the  only  person 
here  who  keeps  the  books  that  he  has  read  in 

152 


a  sort  of  mental  library.  Such  a  room  is  to 
be  found  in  the  house  in  my  brain,  and  during 
wakeful  hours  and  other  times  of  meditation, 
I  am  apt  to  enter  it.  Sometimes  I  make  a 
change  in  the  arrangement  of  the  books — but 
not  often.  The  manner  in  which  they  are 
classified  upon  the  shelves  would  puzzle  a 
librarian — the  novels  particularly.  What  de- 
termined my  grouping  formerly,  made  neigh- 
bors of  Scott,  Daudet,  Dickens,  Tourgenieff, 
Hugo,  Hawthorne,  Bronte,  and  many  more, 
all  poets  at  heart;  while  in  quite  another 
street  lived  Tom  Jones,  Barchester  Towers, 
La  Chartreuse  de  Parme,  Cousine  Bette,  with 
a  large  company  issuing  from  hearts  that 
were  strictly  prose.  But  my  present  and  final 
system  uproots  all  this.  Trollope,  for  ex- 
ample, is  torn  from  Balzac  to  live  with  Scott, 
from  whom  I  have  felt  compelled  to  remove 
Tourgenieff  and  Hawthorne.  Where,  then, 
do  Hugh  Wynne  and  Westways  go?  Though 
written  by  a  poet  at  heart,  they  stand  with 
Trollope  and  Fielding,  because  they  are 
friendly  to  mankind.    They  belong  to  what  I 

153 


call  the  Literature  of  Encouragement;  they 
are  written  with  sympathy,  not  with  misan- 
thropy. 

It  is  preposterous  to  suppose  that  any  Balzac 
or  Flaubert  or  de  Maupassant  knew  more  of 
evil  and  sorrow  and  pain  than  Dr.  Mitchell. 
Four  years  of  mutilated  soldiers  and  fifty  of 
hysteria,  neurosis,  insanity,  and  drug  mania, 
unrolled  for  him  a  hideous  panorama  of  the 
flesh,  the  mind,  and  the  soul.  But  when  in 
one  of  his  books  he  makes  a  doctor  say :  ' '  Who 
dares  draw  illness  as  it  is?  Not  I,"  he  gives 
the  clue  to  his  fiction.  He  omits  nothing  need- 
ful, it  is  the  superflous  that  he  discards.  Just 
as  minutely  as  Flaubert  described  the  horrible 
arsenic  death  of  Emma  Bovary,  could  Dr. 
Mitchell  have  painted  a  dozen  or  a  score  of 
revolting  ends;  just  as  cruelly  as  Balzac 
drew  the  moral  deterioration  of  Pere  Goriot, 
Dr.  Mitchell  could  have  gloated  over  his  own 
victims  of  deterioration.  His  novels  abound 
with  studies  of  decay.  Hugh  Wynne  and 
Circumstance  offer  us  senile  change;  Roland 
Blake,  hysteria ;   Far  in  the  For  est ,  the  insanity 

154 


of  persecution;  In  War  Time  and  Constance 
Trescottj  the  progressive  moral  rotting  of  their 
chief  characters — nor  does  this  finish  the  list. 
But  these  studies  are  not  hostile;  the  author 
does  not  take  open  or  secret  pleasure  in  the 
ills  wherewith  the  face  of  man  is  blackened. 
Consider  what  we  should  have  had  if  Balzac 
or  Flaubert  or  Zola  had  known  what  Dr. 
Mitchell  knew  about  women! 

But  he  emerges  from  his  own  hard  early 
struggle  and  his  long  experience  of  human 
excrescences,  writing  the  Literature  of  En- 
couragement not  Discouragement.  No  mat- 
ter through  what  dark  alleys  his  muse  passed, 
what  mud  she  had  to  cross,  she  comes  to  us 
always  with  her  skirts  clean  and  her  heart 
warm.  She  wishes  us  well,  not  ill;  she  gives 
no  sneer  at  the  evil  in  the  world,  she  is  sorry 
for  it;  her  gospel  is  not  of  hate  but  of  love. 

The  tone  of  Dr.  Mitchell's  books  is  a  lesson 
and  a  tonic  for  an  age  that  is  sick  and  weak 
with  literary  perverts. 

This  is  our  literature's  true  debt  to  him. 


155 


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